


Never an Easy Path

by maplepancakes



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Alternate Universe, F/F, F/M, Fantasy, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2011-07-27
Updated: 2011-09-20
Packaged: 2017-10-21 20:25:31
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 6
Words: 24,277
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/229446
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/maplepancakes/pseuds/maplepancakes
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>John Egbert thought he knew how the world worked. He grew up on stories of the horrible trolls, who constantly invaded the borderlands and never showed mercy to a human. He knew he would become a great warrior who protected humans from these terrifying monsters. But what will he do when he actually meets a troll and learns that the stories he had known all his life weren't entirely truthful?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This fic is in response to this prompt from the kink meme: http://homesmut.livejournal.com/5183.html?thread=3620671#t3620671
> 
>  _Okay. I was watching How to Train Your Dragon, and Toothless reminded me so much of Karkat for some reason. And while this prompt has nothing to do with dragons, I just wanted to explain where this came from (and maybe as an idea vomit for anyone willing to fill this)._
> 
>  _So...I would like to see John trying to befriend an injured Karkat in a fantasy setting with a heavy emphasis on plot and on relationship development from strangers, to friends, to lovers._
> 
> I also have quite a bit of worldbuilding notes, and I'll include snippets at the end of each chapter.

_The only good troll is a dead troll._

Those were the words John Egbert had lived by all his life. From the moment he could walk, he knew that trolls were a threat and had to be taken care of swiftly. They ate livestock, they destroyed homes, and they did unspeakable horrors to any human who they managed to get their hands on. They showed no mercy, so no mercy was to be shown to them.

And, like all young men, John believed this. Why wouldn't he? For nearly sixteen years, he had seen the widows weep at the loss of their spouses. He had seen hunting parties leave the city only to return with a third of their men still alive. He knew that, like clockwork, they would come every summer and lurk in the woods around the town, waiting for a tasty snack. Even the farmers needed to have mercenaries present when they tried to grow anything, as trolls didn't seem to discriminate when they chose who to attack. They were dangerous, and they were the reason John had been raised as a mercenary in the first place.

And yet…

The arrow landed in the target with a solid thunk, the metal tip stuck deep in the wood. John lowered his bow, eyes still trained on the arrow, evaluating his shot. It was just to the left of the bulls eye by maybe four inches. Not too bad, he thought to himself. It was the closest out of the half-dozen arrows currently stuck into the target. He was improving, though he knew that he needed to get better even faster if he was to have any hope of surviving this upcoming season of troll attacks.

John was one month away from his sixteenth birthday. In one month, he would be an adult, and all the responsibilities of an adult would be thrust upon him. That meant that he would have to go out with the men and women who protected the borderlands and fight off any trolls that tried to invade. It wasn't even an issue of if they attacked: they came every year, as soon as the snow melted and the world came back to life. Every summer was an exercise in fighting off invaders, and it had been so since long before John was even born. To make matters worse, nobody even knew what the trolls wanted. They just came, attacked all summer, and left in the fall.

This would be John's first summer actually fighting off trolls. Previously, he had always helped in an indirect way. He made arrows, cared for the injured, kept everyone fed, those kinds of things. But he had never met a troll before, much less killed one, and the thought of actually doing that was worrying, to say the least.

At least he wouldn't be alone, he told himself. He had three great friends, and they would be right there with him, protecting the southern border of their home country of Prospit. He could count on all of them being there, and somehow that made his stomach churn less.

"Wow John, you almost hit the center that time!"

John just grinned at that. Speak of the devil… "Thanks Jade," he said, turning to face his friend and favorite cousin, "I'm getting a lot better at this, I think. Remember how bad I was when I started?"

Jade, who was standing back a bit to give John room as he practiced, giggled at that and said, "Yeah, you couldn't even hit the target. It'll be a lot easier to go hunting now, you won't have to set all those snares anymore."

That was true, hunting had been a chore before he had learned to hold a bow properly. John's mind jumped to other conclusions instead, and he held up his bow again like he was going to shoot as he said, "Or I could be Robin Hood. I'll steal from the rich and give to the poor!"

"You'll have to find a rich snob to steal from first, the rulers of Prospit are really nice and give to the poor anyway." That fact didn't remove the geeky smile from either of their faces, though.

John turned to look back at the target again, and he found himself squinting to see. The sun was starting to set, and even though their little hangout was well-hidden in the woods, the rays of the setting sun still managed to creep in. They probably had an hour or so before darkness engulfed the area, and they definitely didn't want to be outside then. Even though it wasn't troll season yet, there were still all sorts of animals out there that could make a quick meal out of either of them.

Jade must have noticed it as well, as she said, "We should head back," as she moved to pick up her own gear off the ground. Then she added, "I won't be able to come out here tomorrow, but we can keep practicing the day after, okay?"

"Sure thing," John responded, stowing away his bow and moving to go get his arrows.

"And don't come out here alone like you did that one time, Those wolves are still out here somewhere," Jade said, almost scolding John with her words, though they lacked that bite her words had when she was honestly upset.

John just waved her off. "Don't worry! Do you really think I would do something stupid like that again?"

Jade gave John a look, but she didn't say anything else. Evidently that was enough to satisfy her.

As they walked back, the pair chatted about the upcoming spring festival and what they were going to do there. It was still some time away, but it was a big event in their small town on the borderlands of Prospit, so of course they were excited. Along with that, this was the first year they could participate in the single's dance, which was where many young men and women found their future lovers. While John was excited about being able to participate, he was also nervous. Very few people outside of his small circle of friends even talked to him that often, and he definitely couldn't marry either of the two girls. Jade was family, so she was right out. The other girl, Rose, was pretty much his best friend ever. While he did love her a lot, it was entirely platonic. He couldn't even imagine liking her romantically, regardless of what his awesome novels told him about romance between buddies.

Jade must have noticed John's apprehension, because she frowned as she said, "What's wrong?"

"Huh?" A moment later, John realized what Jade was talking about. "Oh! I was just thinking about the dance, and how we're supposed to, you know…find a partner?"

At that, Jade giggled. "Ooooh, is that what's been worrying you? That's not a big deal."

"Hey now, it's a pretty big deal," John said, "In fact, it's one of the biggest things to 'deal with' right now! What if I end up with someone I don't like? Or worse yet, what if nobody likes me, and I end up growing old all by myself?"

Jade didn't have the same worries as John did. She and Dave had been practically married ever since they were fourteen. Them hooking up would be pretty much the biggest anti-surprise of the century. John, on the other hand, was not that lucky. Romance is hard, he told himself. It's hard, and nobody understands.

But Jade, for her part, just looked amused at John's reaction. "C'mon, you never worry about that kind of stuff! And if you don't find that right person, then you can just try again next year. Everyone has that special someone they're destined to be with, and it's ok if it takes you a little longer to find them. You're not even an adult yet, you still have lots of time."

"I know," John said, sighing, "It's just that everyone is happily married by seventeen in my books. I guess I expected it to be like that, or something."

"Well you're not seventeen yet, so it could still be like that," Jade said, and then she paused thoughtfully for a moment before continuing, "Or you could write your own book about romance, once you find that right person."

"Hey yeah, that's a great idea! Then all the other guys like me won't worry about not finding Ms. Right by the time they're adults, because they'll have proof that sometimes it happens later!" John was pretty talented at overlooking the fact that most of the couples in the village weren't fresh young adults when they got married. Or that most of the people who would read that hypothetical book would probably not be young men looking for love in all the wrong places. But it was enough to get John to stop worrying about romance, and that's what counted.

Now he just needed to figure out what to do with this fighting business, and he would be set.

\---

The next day, John did exactly the opposite of what Jade had told him to do. By mid-morning, he was out in the middle of the woods again, practicing his archery. He didn't do it to upset anyone, though. It was actually the opposite: he wanted to get really good at archery, so that nobody had to worry about him when the attacks started happening. That was only a few months away, and John definitely needed all the training he could get.

As he shot arrow after arrow, John thought about the upcoming summer. What else did he need to do to prepare? He probably should get some more swordsmanship lessons from Dave's brother, he was still sorely lacking in that area. John was trying to put that off, though. He had a feeling that shooting trolls from a distance was going to be hard enough to do, and he didn't even want to think about how much harder close-quarter combat would be. As much as he loved the idea of protecting the town, he really wasn't looking forward to the fights. Why did protecting people have to be so hard?

Soon his quiver was empty of its arrows, and he moved to retrieve them again. The blades were starting to get a little dull, he noticed with disdain as he inspected each one he pulled out. He would have to sharpen them all tonight.

His thoughts were interrupted suddenly as he became aware of this strange sound. Curious, John carefully made his way towards the source of the sound, trying to be as quiet as possible. He was used to coming across animals in this forest, and he had years of practice of quietly sneaking up on whatever he came across. Hopefully it was a rabbit, he thought to himself, that would make a tasty stew tonight.

The strange sound, which John soon recognized as this weird kind of growling, was coming from a nearby path. It was the one he usually took to get back to the main road and get home, actually, but that made it all the stranger. Animals usually stayed away from the path. What could be there? Cautiously John made his way up a small hill in the forest, instead of taking the path around. Whatever this was, it sounded angry, and John wanted to be out of biting range if things took a turn for the worst.

As he got closer to the crest of the small hill, and thus closer to the strange growling sounds, John realized that there was more than one of those things. It was hard to tell, but there were at least two distinctly different animals, and they seemed to be growling at each other. Almost like…talking? If animals could talk, that is. Taking note of this, John crouched down and moved more slowly as he finally reached the top. Then, ever so carefully, he peeked over the edge, looking down a good fifteen feet to the path below. And, once he realized exactly what he was looking at, his heart nearly stopped in his chest.

Trolls.

Not just one troll, but multiple trolls. Three, to be exact.

Now, John had never seen a troll before in his life. The adults had always made sure to keep the bodies of the trolls far away from the village, lest they scare the young children. But he had heard the stories from the older boys, and they were absolutely frightening. Twelve feet tall, humongous horns and sharp, gnashing teeth, ashen skin, claws that could rip out a man's heart, and the most horrible beady eyes. That was the description that had haunted John's nightmares, and that was what John was seeing right now.

Well, mostly. The trolls certainly weren't twelve feet tall. They looked like they had maybe half-a-foot or so on him in terms of height. And they didn't quite look like horrible monsters. In fact, they almost looked like a human had painted their skin dark grey and glued some horns to their head. But the claws and the teeth, those definitely looked real.

The one in the front, he (John was assuming they were all boys, as they looked more like men than women) looked to be the leader. He looked to be arguing with a second troll, though John wasn't sure what could have upset them. The third troll wasn't speaking up currently, but he sure did look pissed off at the other two. The third troll had different horns, too: while the first two had long, sharp-looking horns, the third one had little nubby horns. John had no idea why, and he certainly didn't know why he noticed that, of all things.

Then, suddenly, the third troll took two steps over to the first two, and he started yelling at both of them. Well, growl-yelling, but it was louder and angrier-sounding so John figured it was the troll equivalent of yelling. The leader didn't seem happy about this, and he started growl-yelling at the third troll, and it looked like a fight was going to break out between them.

He could sneak off and warn the town, John realized. They certainly weren't paying attention to him at all, so he could easily sneak off and get fighters to come out here and take care of these three trolls. But at the same time, he knew that these trolls would probably have moved on by the time anyone else got out here. It was nearly ten minutes of walking to get back to town, and if you factored in the time it would take to get a group together and geared up, it could be half-an-hour before anyone got back to this spot. Given how late in the morning it was, these trolls would probably have moved off to a dark spot to sleep by then. They were nocturnal creatures, after all, and it was odd enough that they were out this far past sunrise.

No, going back to get help wasn't an option. John either had to run away, leaving the trolls to whatever sinister business they were up to, or take care of them himself. He certainly could manage it, if he wanted to: he was skilled enough to get two shots off before they realized just where he was, and maybe another three before they managed to get up the hill. If he aimed for their torsos, and if they were biologically similar enough to humans, then John could probably dispatch them. He could hit a rabbit from twice the distance these trolls were. Though he was outnumbered, he had the high ground and the advantage of surprise.

Yes, that was going to be the best option. This was such a small group, and it was far too early for the main forces to be attacking. They had to be scouts of some sort. If they got back to their group, they could potentially give out whatever information they had been trying to gather. John had no idea what that information was, but it had to be something to hurt his town, right? Trolls were conquerors, and they showed no mercy. Of course they would be scouting for an attack of some sort.

John carefully reached back and grabbed his bow, pulling it off his shoulder soundlessly. Then he reached back again and grabbed one arrow. Finally he got up from his crouching position and balanced himself on one knee, and then he nocked his arrow and took aim. He aimed for the leader first. Better to take out the leader and leave them in chaos, that would give him more time to shoot.

He just had to take that first shot. He just had to aim and let go of the string, and there would be one less troll in the world. All he had to do was shoot, and everything would be alright.

So why was he shaking so much?

The argument was picking up. Nubby-horns shoved the leader, and the leader shoved him back. They both flashed their teeth at each other, clearly ready to fight. It would be much harder to hit them if they were moving around, so John needed to shoot now.

And yet, he couldn't. His hands were shaking too much, and he couldn't keep the point of his arrow trained on the leader. He was going to lose his chance here, and it was all because he was too scared to take that first step.

Finally, something snapped in John. He wasn't even sure what caused it, but something just gave out within him, and he squeezed his eyes shut as he let go of the string.

John didn't see what happened next, but he did hear it. He heard the arrow whiz through the air, and barely a second later he heard the sickening thunk of an arrow burying itself deeply within a squishy living being. That was quickly followed by a scream of pain, and absolute silence from the other trolls. Then he heard the sound of brush being crushed, and John finally opened his eyes, just in time to see nubby-horns tumble backwards off the steep edge on the other side of the thin road. The crashing noises continued as nubby-horns rolled down the forty-plus foot embankment, screaming in pain all the way down.

Then, suddenly, the remaining two trolls turned and looked directly at John. They knew exactly where he was. What's worse, John could have gotten a second arrow off in the time it took for that entire mess to happen. But he had frozen, and now two trolls knew exactly where he was, and he found himself unable to even reach back for another arrow.

Unable to do anything else, John did the next best option: abscond.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'll be posting this story both here and on the kink meme, but since LJ is down, it goes up here first. I'll put it up on lj as soon as I can.

It was a miracle that John made it back to the town without being attacked. He had been so sure that the two remaining trolls would hunt him down, hell-bent on revenge, but apparently they weren't too concerned with one small human boy. He must not have been too much of a threat to them, if they just let him go like that.

Or they wanted to rescue their fallen ally instead of chasing after an enemy. Would trolls actually do that?

Regardless of the reason for his easy escape, John found himself back at his house before he knew it. It was still early enough in the day that Nanna hadn't started lunch yet, so John was able to sneak in the house and get to his room without attracting any attention. He really didn't want to talk to anyone right now, he was still too freaked out over what had happened.

As soon as he had dropped his weapons on the floor, John collapsed onto his bed with a sigh. His heart was still going a mile a minute, but now it was for a different reason. He had killed someone. Not just a rabbit or a deer, but an actual living person. Troll, whatever. They looked enough like humans that it still felt like he had killed a person, and that was the source of all John's problems here.

There was one less troll in the world. One less monster to threaten Prospit, one less mouth to feast on the flesh of humans. John should have been happy about this. His family would be so proud of him, if they knew he had killed his first troll. But honestly? John just felt regret. His heart burned, tears stung at the corners of his eyes, and he had to bite down on his lip to keep a sob from coming out.

This wasn't like hunting for dinner, or fending off wolves as they attacked a herd of sheep. This was a living, breathing person he had killed in cold blood, without them even knowing he had been there. They weren't attacking him, they weren't even that threatening. He had been in no danger, he could have just snuck away from the entire situation. No matter how he tried to pretty it up, it didn't hide the fact that he had just killed an intelligent creature.

No, not killed. Murdered.

\---

John wasn't sure when he had fallen asleep, but by the time he woke up the sun was already starting to sink on the horizon. He must have missed lunch, he realized. And dinner. It didn't matter, though, because John wasn't feeling that hungry. His stomach was still in knots from what had happened before.

Speaking of which, the fact that he was a cold-blooded killer returned to his mind, and it made him feel awful again. He wished that he could just roll over and go back to sleep, but he wasn't feeling tired anymore. Plus he knew he was going to have to force some food into him, or else he would be awake with hunger all night. And hey, if he went out of his room this late, then maybe he could sneak some food without having to talk to his dad. That would be a brief blessing on this terrible day.

John's luck held out: his father was still out, probably working late at the governor's office. He worked late a lot, and it was rare to see him at any time except the morning. Nanna, however, was in the kitchen, washing the dishes from dinner. When John entered she looked up and said, "There you are, John dear! Your nanna was beginning to worry that you were sick. Are you feeling alright, dear?"

"Yes Nanna," John said, letting out a small smile. While he didn't have the best relationship with his dad, he really did love his Nanna, and she always made him feel better. "I was just tired. I'm feeling a lot better now, I promise."

"That's a good boy," Nanna said, and she moved o place a plate of food on the table for him, "I saved you some dinner, I thought you would be hungry."

That made John's smile even wider, and he eagerly sat down at the table. "Thanks Nanna, you're the best!"

As John ate, Nanna hummed a cheerful tune and continued to clean up the kitchen. For the briefest of moments, everything felt like it would be okay. This kitchen was the safehouse against the problems of the real world, and John could have a moment of happiness here. It was the kind of peace he needed after such a rough morning, and it really helped him feel better.

But as he finished off his food, John realized that he would have to go back to the scary world of an adult. Sure, he was still a month shy of sixteen, but already he had to deal with the burdens of adulthood. It was times like this that he needed advice from a wise source.

Hey, Nanna was a wise person, wasn't she?

"Nanna?" John sounded hesitant as he spoke, mostly because he wasn't sure how to approach the subject.

Nanna, on the other hand, was very calm and comforting. "Yes dear?"

"Well...you know a lot about trolls, right?"

"Of course I do," Nanna said, "I used to be quite the warrior when I was your age. Hoo hoo hoo!"

That was hard to believe, but John had heard the stories a thousand times before, so he just accepted it as fact. "I know they always attack us at the end of spring, but is there any chance they could…come early?"

"Come early? Of course not, dear." Nanna must have thought John was worried about troll attacks or something, because as she spoke again she walked over and patted him on top of his head with one hand, while grabbing his empty plate with the other. "Trolls need a much warmer climate than us. It's simply too cold for them to survive up here. If they tried to attack us now, they would freeze to death the first night out in the woods. That's why they stick to the grasslands and the desert most of the year."

Empty plate in hand, Nanna moved back to the basin of water and started to wash the last few remaining dishes. As she did so, she added, "I suppose they could come early, perhaps during the end of spring, but they would need to keep bundled up and stay close to fires at night. I imagine they wouldn't do that, it would make them too easy to find in the woods. But it is a funny thought, isn't it? Trolls running around in large coats, barely able to move with all the cloth they need to stay warm. Hoo hoo hoo!"

That was the most sensible answer, and John knew it was what everyone else would tell him. However, he had seen trolls with his own eyes. It wasn't even April yet! The snow had only just recently completely melted away! Not only that, but it still dipped below freezing at night. If trolls needed heat to survive, then why were they up here now? It just didn't make any sense.

Before he had much time to think about it, his thoughts were interrupted by Nanna. "Oh yes, I nearly forgot. Dave came by earlier, looking for you. You should go see what he wanted."

John nodded in agreement. "Yeah, I'll go look for him. Thanks Nanna."

\---

It didn't take too long to find Dave. Unlike most residents of the town, Dave was bright blond, so blond that it almost looked white. It made him stick out like a sore thumb among all the dark-haired Prospitians. But then again, almost everyone from Derse was blond-haired like Dave was, so he really wouldn't have been out of place in his homeland. John had always thought it was kinda cool, actually: Dave, Rose, their older brother, and their mother were the only ones in the entire town who looked like that, which made them unique and cool.

When John caught sight of Dave, he waved to him as he cheerfully called out, "Hey Dave!"

It was loud enough for Dave to hear, even over the noisy crowd around them, and Dave turned around to face John. He was far too cool to give as enthusiastic of a greeting as John had, so instead he just gave a quick nod and said, "John," in acknowledgment as soon as John got closer.

John didn't mind the cool kid act, though. He and Dave had been friends for nearly ten years, ever since his family had moved down here from Derse, so he was used to it by now. He just continued on with his bouncy demeanor, saying, "Sorry I missed you earlier, I was napping. What's up?"

"They're doing a weapon inspection in the morning," Dave said smoothly, "Mainly for the guys our age, to make sure we're taking care of everything. We're getting together tonight to sharpen our blades and make everything presentable. You coming?"

"Yeah," John said, "Of course! I've been practicing archery a lot, so I really need to…"

It wasn't quite visible, since Dave's sunglasses covered his eyes, but John was sure that there was some eyebrow-raising behind those lenses. "Need to what?"

"I- I need to go, I left some stuff at…the place. In. Targets. Yeah." John was already starting to back up as he said that, and there was an awkward pause between when he finished talking and when he took off running back to his house.

His arrows. He had left most of his arrows back in the woods, where he did his target practice.

Hanging out with everyone would have to wait, John would be in deep trouble if he got caught off-guard by an inspection. He had failed the last two, and if he failed a third he would be in a lot of trouble. He needed to get his arrows back before tomorrow morning.

\---

It was quiet in the forest, far too quiet for John's liking. In his rush to get out to his stuff before the sun set, John had completely forgotten about the trolls he had seen earlier. He really should have gotten Dave to go along with him, because then at least the two of them would stand a chance at fighting any trolls off. But no, John hadn't even thought about it until he had reached the targets full of arrows, and now he had to be extra-cautious as he snuck around. He didn't know if the trolls would be able to find him now, since their guards would be up, but he hoped they wouldn't. He just wanted to get home safely without becoming a troll snack.

Arrows collected, John went back to the main path, set on heading back to town as quickly as possible. As he jogged down the path, though, he found himself at a very familiar curve, and he slowed to a walk, then eventually stopped completely. This was the cliff the third troll had fallen off of, John thought to himself as he stepped over and peered down the steep hill into the ditch below. He could see the path or broken branches and knocked over bushes that went all the way to the bottom, and it made John frown. Even if the arrow hadn't killed that troll, the fall surely would have.

Then again, John distinctly remembered tumbling down this cliff many years ago, and the worst he had gotten was a few scratches and a bump on his head. If that troll had fallen just right, he could have avoided the solid trees and rocks scattered around here. It wasn't likely, of course, but it was possible.

Since it was only March, John had the benefit of being able to see through the tree branches that would normally be covered by leaves. That meant he could see all the way down the ravine below, his eyes following along the bends all the way north, until it curved west, towards where the old clubhouse was. It was a path he was very familiar with, and could practically navigate in his sleep.

He didn't make it all the way to the clubhouse, though. About halfway there, he spotted something unusual. It looked almost like a lump of blankets, tucked away under a narrow ledge carved out in the ravine. It was out of direct sunlight, and John could even see that there was still lingering bits of snow around it, where the shade kept it from being melted. But what was that blanket doing out here? Had Jade left it behind, in case she wanted a nap on the way to the clubhouse?

John continued to stare at it for a moment longer, squinting his eyes in an effort to somehow see it more clearly. There were splotches of bright red…somethings, here and there. Mostly on the supposed blanket, but also along the bottom of the ravine leading over to the ledge. A moment later John's eyes snapped open wide as he realized that those red splotches were actually blood, and that blanket was no blanket at all. It was a troll.

Without thinking, John went over the side of the cliff, carefully half-walking, half-sliding down the side. It was steep, but still possible to navigate, and John managed to get to the bottom without tumbling head-over-heels. Once at the bottom of the ravine, he headed north along the ravine, moving as quickly as possible. It wasn't an outright run, as the trees and brush down there made that impossible, but he still went quickly.

Less than a minute later he stopped just short of the ledge the troll was laying under. It was shady underneath, but not fully dark, so John could still make out the troll's general outline. It was nubby-horns, and he looked like death. It wasn't too hard to figure out where the blood was coming from: John's arrow had struck nubby-horns in the leg, and the clothing all around it was saturated with blood. He was also bleeding from several cuts on his face, arms, and legs, presumably picked up from the tumble down the cliff. This troll already looked bone-thin, so it was a surprise that he even had this much blood in him. John couldn't believe that this troll had crawled all the way down here just to die. Why would he do such a thing?

A moment later John got his answer. He had crouched down to get a better look at the troll, and he had started to reach a hand forward, aiming to touch one of the small, blunt horns. Suddenly the troll's eyes snapped open, and John let out a girlish shriek and stumbled backwards, using his arms to protect himself from the forthcoming attack.

He was going to die. His curiosity had brought him down here, and now he was going to die for it.

But that attack never came. John soon realized that this troll hadn't ripped off his face yet, and ever so slowly he started to lower his arms, peeking over the top in an effort to look at the troll in front of him.

Nubby horns remained under the ledge, mostly unmoving, though his eyes were trained on John. They were bright orange-yellow, John realized, with one slit each, like a cat's eyes. He was breathing as well, but the breaths were so shallow that John hadn't even noticed them before. His arms remained where they were, useless, sprawled out on the ground like a rag doll. It looked like this troll barely had the energy to remain on his side, let alone actually move to chase John.

Two thoughts went through John's head. First, he realized that he hadn't actually killed a troll yet. The unexpected relief from that particular thought—which greatly confused John, by the way. He wasn't supposed to be glad that a particularly dangerous enemy was alive, and he didn't understand why he felt that way—was quickly over-ridden by a second, more terrible thought. This troll was heavily injured, possibly lacking a lot of blood, out in partial sunlight (which could potentially hurt trolls), and didn't have enough energy to move. If John hadn't come out here right then, that troll probably would have died of exposure within a few hours.

He had to kill him, John realized.

At this point, it wasn't even about enemies. Well ok, it was partially about that, but John felt more sympathy than anger right then. Either the troll could die a slow and painful death, or John could put him out of his misery.

Knowing this, John reached back and pulled out his bow and a single arrow. He was still kneeling on the ground, but he could shoot from here. It was close enough that John wouldn't miss, either. He lined up the arrow, pointed it at the troll's head, and held there, taking one last moment to look at this fallen creature.

That was when the troll did something so surprising that it dumbfounded John. The troll let out what sounded like a resolute sigh, and he just closed his eyes. He wasn't going to fight back, he wasn't going to even try to get away. It was almost like he wanted to die- no, John thought. No, this wasn't a suicidal troll. This was a troll who had accepted his fate.

Just like last time, John's hands began to shake. If anything, it was worse than last time. Why was he shaking so much? All he had to do was shoot one arrow, and it would be over. There wasn't even any danger here: the troll wasn't fighting it. One snap of the string, and it would all be over.

John threw down his bow in defeat and sank back down into the ground.

He couldn't do it. He couldn't shoot the troll.

"Shit," he said to himself, frustrated, "Damnit! Why can't I do this?! I have to be the first human in the history of the world who couldn't kill a troll!"

He looked back up to the troll, hoping to find some sort of answer there. What did he see that made it impossible for him to kill this troll? What was there to stop him?

All he found was a troll looking back at him, brows scrunched down in confusion. Clearly this troll was just as confused as John was, and that certainly didn't give John any answers.

Then the troll tried to shift his weight, but he stopped suddenly with a pained flinch and a hitch in his breaths. John glanced further down, and his sight was drawn to the arrow sticking out of the troll's leg. The movement had made the wound start to bleed again, bright red blood oozing up around the shaft of the arrow and trickling down to the ground below.

That must really hurt, John realized. He remembered one time, when he had accidentally gotten an arrow stuck in his foot. It had hurt so badly, and that arrow had been removed within minutes of the accident. This troll had been laying here with that arrow in his leg all day.

Then a more horrifying thought entered John's mind, one that was so terrible he actually put a voice to it.

"I did this."

This was all his fault. He had shot the arrow, and he had left this troll out here to die. All the pain and suffering nubby-horns was experiencing was all his fault, and it made him feel absolutely horrible. Why had he done that? Why had he left this living, breathing person to suffer for so long?

 _Trolls need a much warmer climate than us. It's simply too cold for them to survive up here._

Nanna's words echoed in John's mind, and as if to confirm them, the troll let out a rough shiver. Suddenly it was all too apparent that nubby-horns was wearing clothes far too thin for this kind of weather, and freezing was most definitely a threat here.

That was when John came to a very startling conclusion, one that would change his life forever.

He couldn't leave this troll here to die, and he couldn't kill him. So, there was only one thing left to do.

John quickly stripped off his quiver, dropping it on the ground near the bow and loose arrow. Then he undid the loops on his thick winter coat and slipped it off, leaving himself only in his tunic, vest, and pants. He could feel the chill in the air now, but he paid it no mind. He had work to do.

Carefully John crawled up to where the troll was, coat in hand. The troll growled at John's sudden approach, but once again he didn't fight it. The most he did was flinch away from the sudden burst of sunlight as John pulled him out into the open, and the growling subsided as soon as John covered him in his coat. Then John set him down long enough to sling his gear over his shoulder, and he picked up the troll once more, this time standing up as he held the troll in his arms.

This troll was surprisingly light, John thought as he walked north along the ravine. He had been expecting some big, beefy troll with a giant club or something, but instead he had gotten a bean pole. That was probably better in the long run, though, as John wasn't sure he would have been able to carry anyone much heavier. Even now he struggled to go up slight inclines, and he had to stop three times to catch his breath, leaning on a large tree for support.

Finally he reached his destination: the old clubhouse. He hadn't been there in years, and he wasn't sure if any of the others still visited, but it would have to do for now.

Once inside, John set the troll down on one of the makeshift benches which had previously served as seating for the four kids. The troll wasn't really moving much, but he was still breathing, so he was still alive. Great. One task down, many more to go.

As quickly as possible, John swept up the area, cleaning away the loose leaves and cobwebs in the corners. Then he went out behind the clubhouse, to where the firewood had been kept. Their fireplace wasn't the best, seeing as how it had been build when they were all eight, but it would have to do. Both John and this troll would freeze without a fire, and this was the best they had right now.

Luckily John was well-trained in surviving outside, so it wasn't long before there was a roaring fire in the crummy fireplace. John stood there for a moment, appraising his hard work. With a smile he nodded once to himself. This would do. There would be no people-cicles tonight.

John moved the troll, coat and all, over to the fireplace. He put him as close as he could without putting him in danger of catching on fire. He needed to get warmer as soon as possible, and John wanted him as comfortable as he could be before doing the next part. The troll turned his face away from the bright flames, but he stayed close, relishing in the warmth. That was good, John wouldn't have to worry about him being cold. Hopefully. He didn't know what he would do if this wasn't enough to keep the troll warm.

Now for the hard part. John pulled back and sat up so that he could strip off his vest. It wasn't a lot of fabric, but it would have to do for tonight, as he wasn't sure he could sneak back out here again tonight if he went back to the village. He set the vest down next to him, and then he pulled his short hunting knife out of its sheath.

The sound of the knife being drawn startled the troll, who immediately started growling at John again. In response John held up his hands and said, "It's okay, I'm not going to hurt you. I just have to get that arrow out."

John wasn't sure if the troll understood him, and the constant growling didn't do much for his confidence in human-troll language barrier breaking skills, but this had to be done. Thankfully this troll didn't thrash about when John bent over and started to work on removing the arrow from his leg. Unfortunately, John had to use his knife to open the wound a bit wider, as the arrow wouldn't come out otherwise, and that alone made the troll squeeze his eyes shut let out a harsh shout of sorts as his fists tightened in the coat. But John stayed focused on his task, and soon the arrow was out of the troll's leg. The blood started to well up again, and John quickly tied his vest around the troll's leg, acting as an improvised bandage. Luckily the vest had strings on it, which made it easier to tie.

It was only when that was done that John finally looked back down to the troll's face. The troll was still grimacing in pain, and he had pulled the coat around himself tightly. There were going to be holes in the fabric before the night was over, John thought, but he didn't care so much right then. He just wanted to make sure this troll would be okay.

Despite being so cold, the troll somehow had sweat forming on his forehead, and his hair was sticking to the skin because of it. It looked slightly uncomfortable, but when John reached out to smooth the hair away, the troll just pulled back weakly. John took this as a sign that the troll didn't want to be touched, so he didn't try it again.

Instead, John moved away, so as to give the troll some space. He stayed close enough to the fireplace to stay warm, but otherwise he didn't get near the troll. Fear probably had something to do with it too: despite having just cared for this troll, John was still very scared of him, and he was afraid that the troll might attack him in the middle of the night. So he pulled his knees up against his chest and just sat there, alternating between watching the fire and watching the troll. It took a while, but eventually the troll's breathing evened out in what John assumed was a light slumber.

John himself wouldn't be so lucky, though: his mess of emotions was going to keep him up all night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Notes:
> 
> Since they've lived in the desert for so long, trolls have adapted to hot conditions. They feel most at home in the arid heat of the desert, though the grasslands are just warm enough to be comfortable. But trolls are nocturnal creatures, and being out at night is hard in the desert, since it gets really cold there at night. The trolls have learned to compensate for this by wearing clothing that is light, yet keeps in the heat much more effectively than cotton. This fabric helps some in the cold climates of the north, but it's not enough during the winter. Snow is something they haven't learned to conquer yet.
> 
> A troll's resistance to cold is entirely dependent on their blood color. The lower on the hemospectrum, the more resistant to the cold they are. Because of this, redbloods are the ones sent out as scouts in the spring, testing to see if it's warm enough for the trolls to come. It also helps that nobody really care of a redblood freezes, since they're such a low caste anyway.
> 
> Karkat's mutant red blood means he's the best of all the trolls at surviving in the cold. However, he's still a troll, and thus not as good at it as a human would be. Also, the reason Karkat fell asleep at night, when he should normally be awake at night, is because he spent most of the day awake and trying not to die. OOPS. He'll get back on his usual sleeping schedule soon enough.


	3. Chapter 3

John wasn't sure when he had fallen asleep, but it couldn't have been a long time ago, as he felt very tired when he woke up. Sitting up while sleeping had been a bad idea as well; his back was full of so many kinks that even a good stretch didn't get out. He was going to be tired and sore all day, he was sure of it.

But, oddly enough, he wasn't the first one to wake up. His troll companion was awake and busying himself by devouring any insects he could pick out of the partially-rotten floorboards, and the sight of it nearly made John gag. The sound of John's stirring seemed to draw the troll's attention, as he stopped long enough to give John a cautious glance, one which made it clear that John was to remain outside this troll's personal bubble if he wanted to keep his body intact. Trolls must like their personal space, John thought to himself.

It was curious, though. Why would a troll eat bugs with such gusto? The lessons John had received on the subject had told him that trolls were carnivores. They ate meat, particularly red meat, with a small amount of berries and grains mixed in to ease digestion. Surely a troll wouldn't eat gross bugs, right?

Then again, it must have been some time since this troll had eaten. It had been nearly a day since John had shot this troll in the leg (the thought of which drew a pang of guilt from John's stomach), and from the looks of it the other two trolls had just left this one to rot. While trolls were definitely fierce hunters, it couldn't have been easy to chase down anything with an injured leg.

That was when John remembered the snares he had set up nearby. He wasn't the best at actually hunting, so instead he used snares and traps to catch animals to bring back to the house for dinner. There were a few nearby, since this area of the forest was full of rabbits, so John figured he could go check and see if one had been caught overnight. Rabbit was bound to taste better than bugs, at least, and John was starting to feel hungry too.

Before leaving, John added more firewood to the fire, staying well outside of troll-clawing distance as he did so. While he did feel sympathy for this troll, he wasn't stupid enough to get too close. He didn't want to be troll food today, or any other day. But as the fire was built up again, the troll seemed to almost relax some, as if the warmth made him feel better. It probably did, actually: John was feeling chilly this morning, and he was far better suited for the cold than any troll was.

John's luck continued to hold out. Two of the five snares held plump rabbits, and they appeared to be freshly caught. This was definitely going to be a great breakfast, and John could barely contain his glee as he headed back to the small cabin, prized rabbits in hand. He was pretty good at cleaning and cooking animals, so this would be short work.

As he returned, John proudly held up the rabbits for the troll to see, and he said, "Check it out! Breakfast!"

The troll didn't react quite as John had expected, though. His previous scowl was replaced with a mix of curiosity, surprise, and something else John couldn't quite figure out. It reminded him of this dog he had when he was younger: once John had forgotten to feed it, and when he had brought out a double-helping of dinner to make up for it, old Sparky had a similar look on his face. Except this time it was magnified by like a thousand.

Then the troll suddenly pounced, knocking John down and taking one of the rabbits from him in one smooth movement. John was too surprised by the sudden attack to do anything but yelp out in surprise and try to cover his face with his arms, which left him with dead rabbit ass in his face as the troll scampered back to the other corner of the cabin, prize in hand. John blinked in confusion, then sat up and looked across the cabin at the troll, who was greedily eating the rabbit whole.

"Wow, I guess you really were hungry," John said, and then he made a face as he realized just how much of a mess the troll was making. Blood and guts were splattered all over the troll's shirt and John's coat, and the mess on the troll's hands and face made it look like he had just slaughtered a herd of cattle. John hadn't even known that one rabbit could make such a mess. "Well, I guess I won't be getting that coat back…" Though at this point he didn't mind so much, he was sure the troll needed it more than him.

What happened next surprised John more than anything else. Once the troll's stomach was full, suddenly he became aware of the fact that he had made a mess all over himself. He looked down at his clawed hands and made a face, then used his shirt to clean off his hands as best as he could. Next he found a somewhat cleaner patch of said shirt and used it to clean his face. Once all that was done, the troll stripped off the shirt entirely and tossed it into the corner, revealing another, much cleaner shirt below.

That was when John realized that, instead of one, thick layer, trolls wore many thin layers of clothing, probably for this purpose. If they were messy eaters, then of course they would want clean clothes when they were done, and this was far more practical than carrying around several changes of clothes. It was actually pretty clever, and it took John several moments to realize that this didn't fit with the 'trolls are horrible monsters who just kill and eat' mentality. If they were horrible monsters, then surely they wouldn't care what their clothes looked like.

Somehow this thought made John smile. Maybe trolls and humans had some similarities, he thought.

The troll noticed John's goofy smile, and he gave John a glare, as if to say 'what the fuck is so funny'. John, of course, took control of this one-sided conversation, and he said, "Oh, it's nothing, I just thought it was funny, you know?"

The glare stayed put on the troll's face, and John started to feel nervous, which made him babble even more. "I didn't know you were so hungry! Man, if you had said something, I would've gotten more food. I don't want you starving out here or anything, it's not like you can hunt right now, right?"

John really didn't expect an answer, as it was clear that the troll didn't understand anything he said. But the troll was now looking at the second rabbit with that same look he had before, and John quickly held it up as he said, "You want this one too? Well okay, you can have it. I'll just wait until I get home to eat."

And with that, he set the dead rabbit down on the floor in front of him. He really didn't want to get tackled again, if he could avoid it. It looked like such caution was unnecessary, though, as the troll didn't rush forward to get the food this time. Instead he seemed to be almost wary of this situation, alternating between eyeing the food and giving John an untrusting look. It mystified John for a moment, before he realized that full bellies turned hungry predators into cautious ones.

Of course, John didn't blame the troll one bit for this caution. If the situation was reversed, John would be very wary of any food coming from a troll. There was no telling what they might have done to it. So, as a show of good faith, John stood up and gathered his equipment. Initially this made the troll scowl and go on the defensive, as if he expected John to attack him, but John quickly shouldered his weapons and held out his empty hands, and the troll relaxed some. He was still prepared to attack, should John make any sudden moves, but John made his intentions clear by keeping his hands up as he backed away from the troll, heading towards the door. "I'm just going back to the town for supplies," he said, speaking loudly and slowly, as if this would help the troll understand him any better, "Stay here. Don't go outside. I'll be back within a few hours."

The troll growled at John, but he didn't pursue him, so John took that moment to slip out the door and head back into town.

\---

"John!"

John was caught off-guard by a rather excited Jade, who just happened to run up and hug him. Thankfully he managed to stay on his feet this time, but that did nothing to curb the surprise at the sudden hugs he was receiving. "Jade, what's wrong?"

"What's wrong? You were gone the whole night! Just where were you?" Jade sounded very upset, which made John feel guilty, but at the same time she sounded relieved as well.

"Sorry," John said sheepishly, "I left my stuff at our archery range, and by the time I went to go get it, it was already dark. I was at our clubhouse all night."

Jade gave John one last tight squeeze of a hug before pulling away, and she said, "Well don't scare us like that again, okay? Everyone was really worried! I don't think dad slept at all last night."

"Yeah, I should go apologize to him," John said, and he moved to start walking towards their home.

Before he could get even three steps away, though, he was stopped by Jade. "We don't have time," she said, "We have the inspection this morning, remember? You'll be late if you don't go right now!"

The inspection. John had completely forgotten about that. It was really important for him to be there, since he wouldn't get permission to actually go out and fight as a warrior if he didn't pass. All young adults had to do it: they had to show the current warriors that they could keep their gear in order and not mess up when lives were on the line. John was going to be in trouble anyways, he definitely didn't have all of his gear with him. But not showing up on time was way worse than being unprepared, so he finally said, "Alright, let's go," and hurried off with Jade.

The pair made it to the inspection line just before the morning bells rang. The other seven kids their age were already in line, with Dave and Rose at the very end. John scooted in right next to Rose, and he offered her a friendly smile as he tried to catch his breath.

Rose just gave John one of her trademark 'almost disappointed but trying to look above being disappointed' looks. "You're late," she said simply.

"Sorry," John said, "I had some stuff to take care of, and I lost track of time-"

"They almost sent a search party out for you," Rose said, interrupting John.

John blinked, and he looked back to Jade, who responded by looking away quickly. "Jade didn't mention that," John said, turning back to face Rose.

"It doesn't matter now, since you are here and unharmed." Just as one of the older men started to bark orders, Rose's voice dropped to a whisper, and she added, "I'd like to be privy to the reason why you were out so late. Later, that is."

John nodded, and then all of them went quiet and stood at attention, ready for the inspection.

It was nerve-wracking to just stand there, waiting to be yelled at. John knew that the older man in charge of inspections would find some reason to yell at him. He always did. All John could do was watch him look over the others, nodding to them each in turn, before finally coming over to John. Immediately the older man frowned, and he barely looked over John once before saying, "Pay attention people, Mr. Egbert here is the perfect example of someone who is _not_ prepared."

This earned a snicker from a few of the others, though John's friends thankfully remained silent. The man continued, tapping the back of his hand against John's chest as he said, "He doesn’t have his coat, he's missing his spare bowstrings, His sword isn't belted on correctly, and look at this! His arrows are damaged!"

John tensed up as the man reached over and took an arrow out of John's quiver. Silently he prayed that it wouldn't be the one that had previously been stuck in the troll's leg. Please, oh please, just let him have that bit of luck.

Of course, he wasn't lucky at all, and the man had pulled out the blood-covered arrow. "What is THIS? It looks like you gutted a deer with it! Just what happened, boy?"

John laughed nervously as he looked away. He was caught. There was no way he was going to be able to explain this away. Now everyone was going to find out about his fiasco with the troll, and he was going to be in so much trouble. He wouldn't have been surprised if he ended up grounded for life, even.

But John figured it was better to be honest here. It would be a lot worse if he lied and they found out the truth later. Plus John was a terrible liar, they would have known he was lying right away. "Trolls, sir."

The man's brow scrunched down as he gave John a scrutinizing look. "What was that?"

"Trolls," John said a little louder, "I shot a troll with it, sir."

The other teens began to laugh. Dave let out a sigh and looked away, while Jade just covered her face with her hands. Rose was the only one who was actually listening to John at this point: everyone else had quickly written him off as a loser who was making up stories. Even the man inspecting their gear thought he was crazy, and he let out a loud laugh as he said, "Boy, I don't know what ideas you have in your head, but you did NOT shoot a troll. Nevermind that you couldn't even hit a troll in the first place, no troll has ever bled this color." At that last part, the man indicated to the arrow in his hand, then tossed it back to John. "You better be prepared next time, or else you're in for a world of trouble."

It was good that the man moved on to Jade after that, because John felt like he would just die of shame and embarrassment if this had continued any longer. He just stared at the ground, clenching his fists around the arrow in his hands, trying not to think too much about how much it hurt to be the laughing stock of the whole town again.

Stuff like this was the reason why John only had three friends.

\---

It was mid-afternoon by the time John was able to go back to the cabin again. After the fiasco at the inspection, John had been ordered into extra training sessions with Bro and Dave. He was sore all over, and he knew he would be sporting a few bruises by tomorrow. Bro was a great instructor, but he really didn't show mercy when it came to practice. Luckily he was able to use the excuse of patching up his own wounds to swipe some bandages and other medical supplies, which he quickly stowed away to take back to the injured troll.

Speaking of which, that same injured troll was actually asleep when John showed up. The noise of John opening the squeaky door quickly brought him out of his light sleep, though, and John was met with a wad of bloodied clothes being thrown at his head while the troll shrieked at him in some foreign language. "Well hello to you too," John said sarcastically as he tossed the clothes aside and closed the door behind him.

The troll was clearly cranky from his sleep, even moreso than he had been earlier, but his growls quickly subsided as he saw John set his bag down on the floor. The troll sniffed at the air, and he got that same hungry look on his face as he realized what John had brought. The sudden change in demeanor actually made John's mood improve, and he chuckled as he pulled out the small bundle containing some meat and cornbread. "Here you go," he said, tossing it to the troll, "Some leftovers from lunch. I hope you can eat cornbread, it's about the only baked good I can actually stand eating."

John's thoughts were confirmed quickly, as the troll scarfed down the meat and bread in quick bites. This time it wasn't nearly as messy, though, which further supported John's idea that the troll had just been ridiculously hungry before.

Next John brought out the waterskin and bowl, which he set down on the floor instead of tossing over. The troll eyed it and gave a short, curious chirp, though John didn't know if that was actually a word in the troll's language. Whatever the case, John figured he should explain, and he said, "It's water. Waaaater. I figured you would be thirsty, so I brought you some. You can drink it." And then he mimed drinking from a cup, to further cement the idea.

The troll seemed very unsure about this, and he carefully took the water skin in his hands and inspected it. He uncorked the top and sniffed at it, then looked it over again. Finally deciding that it was safe, the troll drank from it, first taking a small drink, then quickly downing the rest. It was really funny to watch, and John didn't even realize he had been staring until the troll frowned at him again.

Finally, he pulled out the last small bag, from which he removed some washcloths, another small water skin, some bandages, and a few metal tools. Not wanting to take any chances, he set them all out for the troll to see. Then he sat down on the ground, his left leg out, and he picked up the bandages and mimed wrapping them around his leg as he said, "I need to patch you up. Will you let me fix your leg?"

That seemed to be too much for the troll, and he just continued to scowl at John. The lack of approval didn't faze John, though, and he picked up a washcloth and the water and scooted closer. A growl quickly joined the scowl, and John saw the troll's hands tense, like he was preparing to push himself off the ground and attack. John stopped, held up his hands in defense (which seemed to be a pattern with their interactions), and then indicated to the troll's injured leg. Then he pointed to the medical supplies again, and back to the injured leg.

Somehow it got through to the troll that John was here to help, not hurt, so the troll stopped growling and gave a short nod. As if to test this, John scooted closer, and when no attack came he carefully put his hand on the troll's knee. The troll kept his eyes trained on John, but he didn't attack. Good, John thought to himself as he gave the troll a smile in return. They were making progress.

It took a minute to undo the blood-soaked vest which had been used to cover the wound, and it was tossed in the corner without much thought. Next John rolled up the troll's pant leg, taking care not to brush against the wound as he did so. With all the fabric out of the way, John was finally able to see the wound properly, and he couldn't help but flinch as he saw just how bad it was. The arrow had gone deep, and John was sure it had hurt a lot. "I am so sorry," John said, the sympathy and guilt painfully clear in his voice, "This must have hurt a lot."

The troll grunted in response, and John thought that maybe the idea was getting across, even if the words weren't. But that wasn't enough, not to John. This was all his fault, and he needed to make things better, no matter what it took. So he looked back up to the troll, determination in his eyes, and he said, "I'm going to make up for this. It was wrong of me, to shoot you like you're some wild animal or something. I don't know how I'll ever make up for hurting you so much, but I'm going to try."

Something strange came over the troll then. His eyes widened for the briefest of moments, and John couldn't help but wonder if the troll had actually understood him. For that moment, it was like an understanding had passed between them. It didn't suddenly make everything better by any means, but for that moment both boy and troll understood each other.

Of course, the moment passed quickly, and the troll was glaring at John again. He made an annoyed noise, as if to say 'get on with it already,' and John turned back to the task at hand, focusing all of his attention on fixing up the trolls leg. "This'll burn a little," he said, then he used the water and the washcloth to clean up the wound, which did draw a pained noise from the troll. John glanced over to check on the troll, and he saw that the troll was biting down on his lip to keep from yelling out in pain, and his teeth were making tiny red pinpricks in his lip. This urged John to finish as quickly as possible, so as to keep the troll from hurting for even longer.

It was all over before he knew it. One of the other washcloths was placed against the wound itself, and the bandages were wrapped around the leg, holding the washcloth on. Once done, John smiled proudly at his handiwork, and then he looked back to the troll again as he said, "See? All done!"

The troll finally let out that pained breath he had been holding in, and he glanced down at the bandaged leg. Seeing this, John asked, "Does it look ok?" Which in turn got a nod from the troll before he settled down on the ground again, nestled up in John's coat.

At that, John looked out the window again. The sun was beginning to set. John wouldn't be able to stay overnight again: he would have to go home and face his family tonight. He got some extra firewood and, still giving the troll plenty of room, tossed it on the fire. It would be enough for the whole night, but he left some near the fireplace, so the troll could add it if he needed to. He still looked really weak, but he seemed to be improving. Perhaps the sleep and food had done the trick.

"I have to go now," he said to the troll, "But I have one last thing for you."

John pulled the last two things out of his bag: a bound book of blank paper, and some charcoal pencils. "I thought this might help you pass the time," he said, "I don't know if you draw or write or whatever, but hey, it's better than nothing, right? Just don't tell dad, he doesn't know I swiped it from his room." It was silly to say, though. If his dad found out that he was keeping a troll in the clubhouse, a stolen memo book would be the least of his worries.

But John left it at that, and he gave one final farewell to the troll, saying, "I'll be back tomorrow afternoon, so just stay here until then. I'll bring more food and water."

With that, John left the cabin, heading home with higher spirits than when he had initially left the town barely an hour ago.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Notes:
> 
> Trolls have a much heartier immune system than humans. They rarely catch colds, and even when they do they're rarely sick for longer than a few days. Along with that, they heal at an accelerated rate. A wound which may take a week to heal on a human is completely healed within three days on a troll.
> 
> There are urban legends about trolls having impenetrable skin, but those are just exaggerated stories. Trolls do have tougher skin, but it really only helps against bludgeoning weapons, like fists and clubs. Slashing and piercing weapons, like swords and arrows, go through troll skin with few problems, though the tougher skin does help to slow weapons, meaning that arrows make shallower wounds on a troll than they would on a human. This, combined with the aforementioned fast healing, is where the myths of undefeatable trolls come from.
> 
> Humans who live in the borderlands take the defense of their towns very seriously. They drill their young adults constantly, making sure they understand just how serious fighting trolls is. They are the last line of defense between the towns and the wilderness, and they can't afford to be caught off-guard. It's not uncommon for particularly weak or unskilled young men or women to be used as an example to teach the others how not to act. These 'examples' are frequently ridiculed by the fellow warriors, and they are scrutinized far more heavily than anyone else. It's not uncommon for these men and women to either give up on being a warrior or to leave the town of their birth entirely once they become an adult.
> 
> Some would draw parallels to this treatment and how trolls will cull the weaker members of their species. Warriors, however, will deny these claims, saying that they would never kill anyone for being weak. To some, the ostracizing and humiliation is considered worse than being outright killed.


	4. Chapter 4

It only took another day for the two of them to work out a pattern. Every day, John would bring the troll some kind of food, usually meat and bread or nuts. Then the troll would eat while John tended to the injured leg. It worked for both of them, because it kept the troll distracted and less likely to claw John's face off. It was a win-win situation.

Over the following week, John noticed something very important about his 'guest': his injury was healing abnormally fast. John had seen what an arrow could do to a person, and if a human had been hit in the leg they would have been out of action for at least a month, if not longer. However, this troll was looking good as new within a week. In fact, by the eighth day, only a small mark remained. It was quite surprising, and almost a little scary: if trolls could heal so quickly, then it was no wonder warriors from the village were ordered to kill them on sight. An injured troll could come back and kill far too soon.

But John did his best to keep those thoughts tucked away, and focused instead on taking care of this troll. This, of course, meant that John would babble endlessly at his strange guest, even though said guest couldn't understand a word of what he said. "Wow, you sure do heal fast! You're like some super-healer, right? Oooh, or maybe you have magic for that! But I've never seen you do magic. Can you do magic? I guess not, if you could heal yourself you would've done it before now."

The troll largely ignored John, as he was more interested in the delicious chicken John had brought for him.

When he was done cleaning the troll's leg, John didn't bother putting a new bandage on. The wound was pretty much closed up, and it would be a waste of resources to just bandage it again. This, however, caught the troll's attention, and he chirped curiously as he looked at his leg, then at John, then at his leg again. John, who had become pretty talented at deciphering what the troll was trying to say, responded with, "It's okay, it's healed. You don't need bandages anymore. All better."

While the words were lost on the troll, the meaning somehow managed to cross the language barrier, and the troll nodded. At least that was easy to understand. The troll then finished up the chicken in two quick bites, and then he rolled his pant leg back down, covering up his leg. The pants weren't his own, though: John had quickly realized that the troll's many thin layers wouldn't keep him warm here, and he had brought out some more suitable clothing. John happened to be just a few inches taller than the troll, but their body types were about the same, so the clothes generally fit. The troll just had to cuff the sleeves and pants. He didn't seem too happy to be wearing a bright red tunic and black pants, though. He had initially refused the clothes all together, for reasons John couldn't quite get, until he had realized just how cold it got here at night.

Finally, the troll stood up and carefully tested his leg. The limp in his step was almost unnoticeable at this point, and John wondered if even that would go away all together with time. All in all, the troll seemed pretty pleased with how well he had healed up, and his usual scowl was replaced with what looked almost like a smirk but was probably the closest the troll could get to a smile. He seemed far too angry to give a proper smile, anyway.

"I'm glad to see you're doing better," John said honestly, "I was worried, I thought you wouldn't be able to walk after an injury like that. I would've felt like a real fuckass if you couldn't walk again."

For the most part the troll ignored John's rambling, as he was far too interested in his own ability to move without being in pain. However, his ears perked up near the end of John's last sentence, and he looked back at John. John himself was confused by the sudden look from the troll, and he said, "What?"

The troll continued to stare, but what came out of his mouth a moment later distracted John far more than the staring did. "Fuckass."

John didn't even know how to respond at first. He had never heard the troll speak in Prospitian before. Hell, he didn't even know that trolls could speak any human languages! To say this was a surprise would be an understatement. "You can talk!"

Suddenly John was moving forward into the troll's personal bubble, which the troll most definitely did not like, and the effort earned John a cautionary growl. It made John stop moving towards the troll, but he continued to talk. "I didn't know you could speak my language! Why didn't you say something before?"

Given how the troll wasn't responding to John's words, other than to growl and back away and keep himself outside of stabbing range, John quickly figured out that the one word had just been a fluke. Perhaps the word was the same in both of their languages, or something like that. The troll language and Prospitian were very different from each other, but there had to be a few words that were the same.

"I guess you can't talk after all," John said with a dejected sigh, "Man! I was hoping we could talk or something."

But this little encounter wasn't entirely pointless. While the troll might not be able to speak John's language, there was certainly no reason why he couldn't learn. Even knowing a few simple words would help with their communication. "So…I guess you can't understand me, huh? How would you feel about learning?"

The troll just shot John a confused look, so John just went ahead with his idea. He indicated to himself and he said, "I'm John."

"John?"

"Yes, John."

The troll nodded decisively. "John fuckass."

John frowned. "No, that's not it! It's just John."

But the troll wouldn't give up, and he continued to call John by that immature name, so John just gave up and let the troll call him John fuckass. It wasn't like anyone else would hear that silly name, after all. "Okay, fine, you can call me that. Now what's your name?"

John was quickly met with a confused look, so he decided to go about it in a different manner. He pointed to himself and said his own name again (just John, though; while he would let the troll call him John fuckass, he certainly wasn't going to reinforce it), and then he pointed to the troll. The troll frowned, and he didn't answer right away. Finally he said a series of growls that John couldn't even begin to understand, and he repeated the same sounds again once he saw John's confused look. Finally John did his best to say it, and he said, "…Kar…kat? Karkat?" It had sounded like Karkat, at least.

Clearly this wasn't completely right, but the troll must have decided that it was close enough, because he nodded in response.

So this troll was named Karkat. Alright. John could deal with this.

\---

As soon as John got back to the village that evening, he immediately went looking for Rose. Of all his friends, Rose was the one who could help him the most here. She was way smarter than anyone else John knew, so he was sure she would have some ideas on how to teach Prospitian to a troll.

Of course, he was going to leave the troll part out. Rose was one of his best friends, but he couldn't risk telling even her about that particular detail.

Luckily it wasn't too hard to find Rose, as she was at her home, reading one of her grimoires. She was tactful enough to bookmark her page and put the book away when John knocked on her door, though. "Hey Rose, got a moment?"  
"Of course," she said as she tucked the book away on her shelf, "Please, come sit down."

John crossed the room and sat down in one of the chairs near Rose's small table. Rose took the other chair, and she started to pour a cup of tea for herself as she said, "What is on your mind?"

"Well…you had to learn Prospitian when you moved here, right?" It had been a long time ago, but John still remembered that both Rose and Dave had spoken an entirely different language for the first year or so they had lived in this town.

Rose, who also remembered that time, nodded. "Being from Derse, my native language is Dersian. Prospitian wasn't too difficult to learn, however."

"Yeah, see, that's the thing: I met someone who doesn't speak it, and I wanted to teach them the language. But I don't know how to go about it!"

That declaration made Rose raise an eyebrow. "Where did you meet this mysterious person who doesn't speak the language of the country they live in."

"Oh…" Crud. John should have thought of this. "Well…they live over in the next town over, by the Rimey River!"

"Is that where you have been going every afternoon this last week? It's quite a journey." Rose didn't sound like she quite believed the story, probably because of just how long it would take to walk to the next town.

However, John didn't have much choice but to go with it. It had to be someone who lived somewhere else, as they all knew everyone who lived in their town. "Yeah! I know, it's a long walk, but it's worth it. This guy is super-crabby, and I think he's just lonely. I kinda want to be his friend, you know?"

"You are the expert at worming your way into everyone's hearts," Rose said, smiling softly. Without getting up, she reached over to her bookshelf and grabbed a small book. "This will help you," she said, "It has some Prospitian to Dersian translations, and it should aid you in your endeavors as a linguistic instructor. Furthermore, it helps if you begin with objects, as a visual reference makes it easier to understand. "

A Prospitian to Derian translation book wouldn't help too much here, as John was sure Karkat didn't speak Dersian, but he still graciously accepted the book. "Thanks," he said, "I knew you could help me here."

With the exchange done, Rose picked up her tea cup and took a sip. Cup in hand, she said, "If you need further assistance, then consider this: your friend isn't the only one who has to learn."

John didn't quite understand what Rose meant there, but he also knew that Rose often said things that didn't make sense until much later, so he would have to be sure to remember that bit of advice.

Before John had a chance to excuse himself, Rose spoke up again. "You know," she said, "I have a friend who lives near the Rimey River as well. Perhaps we could travel together, the next time I intend on visiting her."

Now this was news to John. Rose did travel a lot, but she had never spoken of friends before. He had to admit, it would be interesting to meet a friend of Rose's, but then he remembered that people were usually disappointed by him, so it probably wasn't the best idea to go meet someone Rose thought highly of. He didn't want to wreck that friendship. "Well, I suppose we could walk together, sure."

Rose smiled softly at that. She must have known what John was thinking, because she said, "I won't force you to meet her if you don't want to. It is just wiser to travel in groups."

"Oooh, I get it!" John was happy to hear that, too. So much so that he temporarily forgot that his 'crabby friend' didn't actually live in the next town over. "Yeah, that would be okay. Just let me know when you're going alright?"

"Of course," Rose answered, "Though I do not travel as often as you do. Speaking of which, you need to be more careful about your excursions, several residents have begun to notice your absence in the afternoons."

John had completely forgotten about that. He had been doing his chores as quickly as possible in the morning, which gave him the entire afternoon to go hang out with his troll friend. "Oh man, I hadn't even thought about that! I'm not going to get in trouble, am I?"

"With a sufficient excuse, you will not." It was fairly obvious that John wouldn't be able to make up a good excuse on his own, so Rose soon added, "If it would help, I could vouch for you. You could simply be spending your afternoons doing extensive training on your own. You could also let Dave and Jade be privy to your activities, and they could strengthen your alibi."

"You guys would do that for me? Thank you so much!" John could feel the sudden anxiety already washing away. If his friends would help keep everyone else off his back, then he wouldn't have to worry about anyone following him to the clubhouse and finding Karkat. It was perfect. It was almost too good to be true.

Almost.

"Of course, you would return the favor, correct?"

When she was met with only a blank look from John, Rose clarified her statement. "I sometimes need to be able to disappear into the night as well. I would hope that you would provide support for me, should such a time occur."

"Oh. Oh!" Finally John got it. "Yeah, sure, I can do that. No problem."

\---

The next afternoon, John was as giddy as a schoolgirl when he returned to the cabin. He had the book with him, not so much because he thought that Karkat would be able to understand it, but moreso because he thought it would give him an idea of where to go with this teaching words business. It helped that the pictures in it were very pretty, whoever had drawn them had put a lot of effort into them.

As usual, Karkat was asleep when John arrived. Being nocturnal, Karkat slept through most of the day, and he was still quite groggy when he woke up. John suspected that normally Karkat wouldn't wake up until after sunset, but that just wouldn't do here. John couldn't stay out that late without raising suspicion, so Karkat would just have to put up with waking up a few hours earlier than normal.

Speaking of which…

"Kaaaaaaarkat," John called out in a semi-hushed voice, softly pushing the door open as he did so. "Kaaaaaaaaaaarkat. Wake up, sleepyhead."

It turned out that such a quiet voice was unnecessary. Karkat was still lying on his makeshift bed of old leaves and John's coat, but he was still very much awake. John had come to expect it, since Karkat was a predator, and predators weren't easy to sneak up on, but he still hoped that there would be a day where he could catch Karkat off-guard. It would be funny to see his sleeping face.

John sat down near Karkat, and he scooted forward as far as he could, moving closer until Karkat gave him a warning growl. Then he pulled out the book Rose had given him, and he flipped it to one of the early pages. "Look at this," he said, "I know it's not your language, but this can help us with teaching you words!"

Karkat eyed the book for a few moments, then he moved to a sitting position so he could squint down at the book more clearly. It was on a page which had drawings of a few kinds of fruit, followed by the words for those fruit in both Prospitian and Dersian. Finally he pointed to one of the pictures—an apple—and made this curious chirping sound. It didn't sound like the usual chirp he made when he was curious about something, though: this one had a harsher bite to the beginning of it, and John was actually able to tell that it sounded more like a two-part sound, like it had two syllables of chirping. He thought it was odd, and he almost asked about it, but then he remembered that Karkat wouldn't be able to understand him.

So instead, he focused on teaching words. "That's an apple. Apple. App-ell."

Saying the word slowly seemed to help, and Karkat only needed a few attempts at the word before he could pronounce it relatively well. They did the same thing with the rest of the fruits on that page, working through each one until Karkat could say them without John saying them first. Some words proved to be problematic, mostly because those words had sounds in them that just didn't exist in the troll's language, so Karkat didn't even know how to make those particular sounds. Bs and Ds sounded identical, possibly because there wasn't a difference between the two in the troll language. There was also trouble with every SH-word, because Karkat kept trying to pronounce it as a regular S-sound, which sounded ridiculous at times. John tried his best not to giggle at the mangled attempts, but even he slipped up at times, which earned glares and yelling from Karkat each time.

Next they tried the 'family relations' page, but Karkat seemed to struggle with that one. He could say the words, but he didn't seem to understand what they meant, even after John tried using gestures to explain the words more clearly. John was sure there was some kind of mix-up, because when Karkat said the words for 'parent,' 'mother,' and 'father' in his own language, they sounded identical. John quickly decided that they would come back to that page later.

They flipped ahead a couple pages, and they came across the different colors. This page was pretty simple, as it had the six primary and secondary colors, as well as a few extra like black, white, brown, and pink. Karkat didn't seem to enjoy this page, and he said 'blue,' 'purple,' and 'red' with a particular edge of spite to them. "Oookay, I guess you just hate those colors," John said in response to one of the outbursts.

There wasn't much time for teaching after that, because it was starting to get dark then. John decided to leave the book with Karkat, along with the strict warning that he should be gentle with it (along with mimed actions of carefully placing the book on the ground and carefully flipping the pages, which Karkat rolled his eyes at.)

To John's surprise, Karkat actually seemed interested in learning new words. They kept up their work with the book for several weeks, going well into April, all with Karkat paying attention to each lesson. For his part, Karkat seemed to soak up the information like a sponge. John rarely had to correct Karkat after he had learned a word for the first time, and even then it was usually a grammatical error he had to correct, such as when he had to explain how one squirrel was a squirrel, but two or more were squirrels, and how most words added the S-sound to the end when there was more than one, and Karkat called it 'fuck dumb,' which made John wonder where he was picking up these bad words.

Karkat wasn't the only one who was learning, though. While Karkat learned words, John learned behaviors, specifically relating to trolls. He could have filled a notebook with what he found, had he thought to write it down in the first place. While trolls did have some similarities to humans, they were very different in other ways, especially when it came to their diet.

John had been right about the rabbit and the cow meat being good for a troll, but some other things had proved to be less appetizing to a troll. Once John tried to take Karkat fishing, but Karkat had freaked out as soon as he realized that they were going to eat the fish they had caught. He had thrown his share back in the river, then called John all sorts of names in both Prospitian and troll for nearly an hour after. John didn't try to feed Karkat seafood after that, he had learned his lesson.

But along with the dislikes, John had learned of a few favorites Karkat had. One such learning experience was in mid-April, just a couple days before John's birthday. With Karkat feeling better, the pair had taken to going out into the woods to walk around for a bit each afternoon, as the cabin was far too stuffy to stay in all the time. It proved to be educational as well, because John was able to point out different types of trees and teach their names to Karkat.

During the particular walk in question, John was trying to explain the differences between the seasons (which Karkat seemed to be getting, though he did look a tad bored), when suddenly Karkat stopped. John nearly ran into him, which was surprising because Karkat normally gave John hell for coming close to touching him, but this time he was far too focused on something else to complain. His eyes were wide, and he was sniffing the air.

John figured it was something dangerous, and he said, "What's wrong," as he looked around them, trying to see what was hiding between the trees.

Karkat didn't respond, and instead he started to move swiftly through the trees, somehow navigating between them without running into any. John tried his best to keep up, but he wasn't nearly as nimble as Karkat was. Fortunately Karkat hadn't run very far, as John was sure he would have lost the troll if he had gone for very long.

The troll in question had stopped in front of a small gap between two trees. He was crouched down in front of it, sniffing at some plants on the ground. John couldn't quite see what it was, so he had to go around one of the trees and stand on the other side before he finally saw what it was. "Strawberries," John asked with an eyebrow raised.

Of course, there were no strawberries on the plants themselves. It was far too early in the spring for them to bear fruit. However, John recognized the leaf patterns, and he could see that Karkat had found a patch of wild strawberry plants. Karkat seemed absolutely mystified by the small grouping of plants, and he gave an approving chirp at them.

"You really like wild strawberries," John said as he crouched down as well, "They're really bitter. The ones we grow back at the town, they're much more-"

His sentence was cut off by a harsh snarl from Karkat, who quickly moved to get in a protective position over the strawberry plants. Apparently John had gotten too close or something. As if to cement this point, Karkat growled out, "Mine," in a very possessive manner.

"Ooookay, they're yours," John said quickly, scrambling back to give Karkat room, "I won't touch them, they're all yours." Apparently strawberries were a very coveted treat for trolls, or at least they were Karkat's favorite.

Karkat seemed pleased by this, enough so that he didn't try to attack John over the strawberry plants, but from then on Karkat insisted on checking on the strawberry plants every day, as if they would uproot themselves and run away if Karkat didn't make sure they were still firmly rooted in the ground. It was a little annoying to walk there every day, but the amusement at watching Karkat act so serious over strawberries more than made up for it.

As long as Karkat didn't catch him snickering behind his back, that is.

\---

"John, can I have a word with you?"

John, who had been lacing up his boots to go do his chores, stopped long enough to look up to his father. The two didn't get along so well, and normally they kept their conversations to a bare minimum, if only to prevent arguments between the two of them. It wasn't that his father was a bad parent or anything: he did try his best to relate to his young teenage son. But perhaps it was that desire to bond that had made their relationship strained. Dad tried way too hard to be buddy-buddy with John, and it just made John upset most of the time.

But still, John couldn't refuse a request to chat from his dad, so he said, "Sure, what's up?" Hopefully it would be a short conversation.

"Well, I know we haven't gotten along so well in the last few years, not since your mother passed away, but I just wanted to say that…" It was odd, to hear his father trail off like that. John's dad was normally a very well-spoken person, and it was strange for him to not know what to say.

The silence didn't last long, though, and John's dad finished his thoughts, saying, "Today's the day you become a man, and I just wanted to say that I'm proud of you. You've grown up into a good person, and no matter what you do, you'll make this family proud."

John felt a deep pang in his heart. Somehow he knew that, deep down inside, he had always wanted to hear these words. He had always wanted some kind of recognition that he was doing something right in his life, that he wasn't just a huge goof-off. But at the same time, he also knew that his father would not be proud of him if he knew that John was often in the company of a troll. Knowing this, the words of praise cut him like knives, and they made his heart ache.

He didn't show this, though. Instead, he smiled up at his dad as best as he could, and he said, "Thanks, dad. It…it means a lot to me."

John's poker face wasn't as solid as Dave's, though, and John could see his father's smile falter for a moment. He had to have seen through John's words, and that made his heart ache even more. He hated lying to his father, especially about feeling, but that's what happened when two people agreed to be cordial to each other.

Awkward silence fell between the two, and John's dad couldn't help but fill it. He pulled out a cake from God-knows-where and presented it to John, saying, "Here, I made this for your birthday."

John instantly recoiled, saying, "Eeew, dad! You know I don't like cake!"

But John's father still pressed the cake into John's hands, and as he did so he said, "Share it with your friends. I'm sure they'll like it too."

\---

John's friends did indeed like the cake. Or, rather, one friend did. John found himself watching the cake-slaughter as Karkat tore the baked goods to shreds, devouring every bite he could. He hadn't seen Karkat eat like this since that first time John had brought him a rabbit, and it was almost mystifying to watch. "I guess you really do like strawberries," John said as Karkat finished off the last bits of fruit-flavored cake.

Karkat nodded in agreement as he licked the remains of the frosting off of his fingers. "Strawberry," he said in broken Prospitian, "taste good."

"Delicious," John said automatically, correcting him.

"Delicious," Karkat repeated, and then he set to the task of licking every bit of frosting off of the plate. Then he tossed the plate down on the ground next to where he sat, and he returned to his usual position of watching John for any sudden movements.

John took this to mean that Karkat was done eating, so he started up with talking again. A thought had occurred to him recently, though it had taken him a while to figure out just how to ask it. "Karkat?"

"Hmm?" Karkat had quickly learned that this was the best way to get John to keep talking, as his previous curious sounds had been harder for John to decipher.

"I was wondering…You're still here. Why?" John had thought that Karkat would run off as soon as he was healed, but Karkat had been well enough to leave weeks ago and still remained.

While Karkat was a quick learner, he didn't know all of the words John had said. Still, he was able to pick out 'you', 'here', and 'why,' which was enough for him to piece together what John was asking. Karkat scowled, though it was a more thoughtful scowl than usual, as if he were displeased but not really angry. Which was odd, because Karkat was usually angry about something.

Finally Karkat gave a short answer. "Too cold."

In response, John raised an eyebrow as he said, "Too cold?"

Karkat nodded. "Too cold. Cold night. Stay…five ten nine night."

"Stay…Oh!" John exclaimed suddenly as he realized what Karkat was saying, "It's still too cold! So you'll stay…five ten nine…fifty nine more nights?"

"Yes. Fifty nine nights." It sounded more natural now that Karkat had heard John say it. Still, there was something to how Karkat was saying it, almost as if he didn't quite believe it. John wasn't sure he did either, especially not after seeing three trolls move through this same area a month ago. But John decided not to pursue it further right then, mostly because he wasn't sure Karkat would understand him if he asked about it.

So, instead, he continued talking. "That's a long time," John said, "Though I'm glad you decided to stay here, I like coming and talking with you. I mean, I know you're a troll, and we're supposed to be enemies or whatever, but I think you're a pretty good guy! "

Karkat's face scrunched up as he tried to pick through the flurry of words, but he got stuck on one that John hadn't taught him yet. "Enemies?"

"Oh no no no," John said quickly, "We are not enemies. We are friends!"

"Friends?" Karkat didn't look any less confused.

"Yeah! Like…see, enemies are bad. Enemies fight. Friends are good! Friends don't fight." John was sure he wasn't explaining this well, but that was the best he could do with the words Karkat already knew.

"Friends don't fight," Karkat said, repeating the last line thoughtfully. Then he frowned again, and he said, "Humans fight."

John couldn't really deny that point. "Yeah…humans and trolls fight."

"Humans and trolls enemies," Karkat said, his words somehow sounding heavy to John's ears.

But John didn't want Karkat to think that John was his enemy, especially not after all this work at becoming friends. So he said, "Humans and trolls are enemies. You and I are friends."

"You and I." Though he was scowling, Karkat sounded more unsure than angry. "John and Karkat are friends?"

John grinned and nodded. "Yep! John and Karkat are friends!" Then he held out his hand to Karkat, extending it as if to offer a handshake.

Karkat just glared at the hand. "No touch." But Karkat didn't growl at the sudden intrusion on his space, and he even sounded more annoyed than upset, so John counted this as progress.

"Okay," John said, pulling his hand away, "But we're still friends."

"Not friends," Karkat said flatly.

John's face fell at that, and he sounded almost like he was whining as he said, "Why noooot? We get along pretty well!"

That whining earned another glare from Karkat. "Fuckass."

"Well fine, we're not friends yet. But we're not enemies either," John stated, trying to at least get some ground here.

The declaration seemed to work, too, because Karkat just looked away and grumbled something in his own before repeating, "Not friends, not enemies."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Notes:
> 
> Troll society is very unforgiving. They do not have the resources to feed and shelter anyone who isn't pulling their own weight, so murder is pretty much legal, so long as the troll doing the killing is of a higher rank than the troll being killed. This has two very distinct effects on the troll population as a whole.
> 
> Firstly, lowbloods have a very short life expectancy. Anyone with yellow blood and below is lucky to live to see their thirtieth year of life, and very few ever live to see their sixtieth. This number gradually increases as you go up the blood caste, with sea dwellers often living to see two hundred years and beyond.
> 
> Secondly, because of the high mortality rate, lowbloods evolve much more quickly than highbloods. For example, psychic powers are a rarity among trolls in general, with maybe one in ten thousand having some sort of psychic power. However, these powers pretty much ensure life for a lowblood, and with the large birth and death rates it is often the lowbloods with psychic powers who end up living the longest. Because of this, over ninety percent of the trolls with psychic powers are lowbloods.
> 
> Psychic powers aren't the only adaption lowblood trolls have. Because adaption is the key to survival, the ability to pick up new information quickly is a common trait among lowbloods. Trolls with this ability are often the first to master a new skill, and they are also the trolls who pick up bits and pieces of the two human languages, Prospitian and Dersian. They are also more versatile when it comes to fighting, as they can learn to use several different weapons in the time it takes a normal troll to learn how to use just one. This ability is also present in higher blood castes, but it is much, much rarer. The highest-blooded troll on record with this ability is a jade-blood who decided to go live with the humans in one of their more tolerant towns in the borderlands.
> 
> There are three distinct languages in the world of Skaia: Prospitian, Dersian, and Troll. Both Prospitian and Dersian come from the same root language, ancient Skaian, but they evolved separately, due to the rather large distance between the two countries. But even before the two countries were officially separate, there was always a distinct difference in who spoke Prospitian and who spoke Dersian. Prospitian is relatively easy to learn, and has always been the common language among humans. Dersian, on the other hand, is much more difficult to speak, and is reserved exclusively for Derse citizens and high-ranking officials. Even in Derse, servants and farmhands are more likely to speak Prospitian.
> 
> The troll language is vastly different from the two human languages. Unless they are taught the language from a young age, humans cannot properly accent words from the troll language. As such, the few trolls that have managed to integrate into Prospit (in much larger cities, and after having proved that they weren't going to backstab humans) typically learned Prospitian to communicate instead of teaching their language to the humans around them. However, a few talented humans have learned the troll language, and though they can't speak it, they can understand it when it is spoken to them.
> 
> A troll can typically learn enough Prospitian to manage day-to-day interactions within a year. If the troll has the special learning ability, this time is usually cut down to four months. Fluency comes at five and two years, respectively.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As a heads up, I am going to update the tags as they become relevant to the story. I'd rather not spoil character appearances before they happen (other than the one I already did haha), so the tags for each character won't show up until the chapter they appear in.
> 
> However, I am adding one tag now, because I changed a part of the story that's coming later: **there will be a major character death by the end of this story**. Possibly more than one, even. I'm not going to say who, but this is just a heads up for people who don't like character death.

"Hey Karkat."

"Mmh?"

"When is your birthday?"

Over the last few weeks, John had grown accustomed to speaking slowly, annunciating all of his words, so that Karkat could understand him. However, despite the clear sentence, Karkat still seemed confused by what John was asking. "Birthday?"

"You know, they day you're born," John said, and he launched into a more detailed explanation, "when a mom and a dad have a baby, they are born on a day, and that is their birthday!"

"John. Your words make no sense." This was actually a phrase John had taught Karkat recently. It was relatively common for Karkat to understand the words John was saying, but not what they meant when they were put in a sentence together. Previously Karkat hadn't been able to get this idea across, which meant that many of their conversations would abruptly end with Karkat snarling something in the troll language and stomping off to go vent for a while. Now there were significantly fewer incidences of Karkat ragequitting conversations.

Unfortunately, John wasn't sure where the disconnect was, so he wasn't sure how to explain this to Karkat. They hadn't reached ideas like 'creation' and 'reproduction' yet, and if Karkat didn't even know what a parent was this was going to be problematic.

In the end John decided to get out the trusty journal again. It was used for drawing more than writing, but it was still invaluable to them. First John drew two stick figure people standing next to each other, and he showed the drawing to Karkat. "See, this is a mom and a dad," he said, indicating to the two figures. Then he drew another, much smaller stick figure between them. "Together they make a baby."

Given how Karkat's eyebrows shot up into his hairline, John wasn't sure if he understood it yet or not. "Is it the same for trolls?"

Karkat shook his head, and he took the pencil from John. Then he drew two stick figures, this time with troll horns on their heads, and in between them he drew something that looked like a caterpillar with a troll head on it. "This," he said, and he indicated to the grub-thing in the middle and said, "Troll baby."

So he understood the word baby, at least. John smiled widely as he said, "That's right! A baby." Then he indicated to both of the babies in turn before saying, "A baby's first day alive is their birthday."

That was enough for the idea to click in Karkat's mind, and he nodded. "First day alive. Birthday."

"My birthday is April- sorry, it is the thirteenth day of the fourth month," John said, correcting himself mid-sentence. Karkat understood months and days, but he hadn't quite grasped that the months all had names. "When is your birthday?"

Karkat thought about that for a moment before responding. "The twelfth day of the sixth month."

A quick calculation later, and John excitedly said, "That's not far away! Only six weeks!"

Karkat nodded in return, but he didn't look happy about the fact that it was almost his birthday. If anything, he looked angry about it. But Karkat always looked angry about everything, so it was possible that he was angry and happy at the same time. Troll emotions were weird anyway.

But something about the way Karkat looked at that moment made John want to ask. He just couldn't resist the curiosity. "What's wrong?"

Instead of answering, Karkat growled something in his own language, and while John didn't actually know what it meant, he recognized the words. It was something Karkat said any time John asked something Karkat didn't want to answer. Having heard those growls, John quickly said, "It's alright, you don't have to tell me if you don't want to."

That didn't reassure Karkat, though. It actually made Karkat give John an even stare, one that was somewhere between confusion and accusation. "You know troll words?"

"Oh no," John answered, wondering if he had committed some cultural taboo, "You just say those words before you say stuff like 'it's complicated' or 'you wouldn't understand,' so I figured that's what they meant. Or something like that."

It sounded like a good explanation to John, but he began to doubt that as he saw the grin spread across Karkat's face. That wasn't a happy grin, that was a 'I have an idea which you aren't going to like at all but we're going to do it anyway' kind of grin.

Finally, Karkat said, "You learn troll words. I learn human words. You speak human. I speak troll."

The idea did seem reasonable. Karkat had a hard time with pronouncing Prospitian, mostly because his tongue wasn't the right shape to get all of the nuances down properly. Likewise, John was sure he would never be able to pronounce the troll language right, because he could never hope to mimic those clicks and keens. If they both knew each other's languages, then they could just talk in their own and still be able to understand each other.

Along with that, the thought of learning a new language was exciting. Rose had tried to teach him some Dersian years ago, but he had given up on it quickly and could only remember a handful of words. But he was older now, so he could force himself to pay more attention and remember things. "Alright," John said with a nod, "Let's try it."

\---

Dave Strider was the most badass teenager in this entire town, and everyone who lived there knew it. He was a natural at wielding a sword, and he was easily the best fighter of the current generation. Not only that, but his icy exterior made it impossible to call him anything but 'the coolkid.' In fact, the only person here who was cooler than him was Bro, but even that was going to be up in the air soon. Dave was going to make an unprecedented career run in the history of the fighters who protected the borderlands, one that his brother couldn't even hope to match.

But Dave never let the fame get to his head. No, he always remembered his humble beginnings as a scrawny kid with only three friends in the entire world. No matter how popular he got, he would never forget where he started.

Now if only he could make progress with a particular one of those three friends, then his life would be perfect.

Of course, that friend had to come running up to Dave just as he was thinking about how he would like to have another chance to ask her to the spring festival. Normally Dave would be thrilled about this, but something about the look on Jade's face made him realize that this was not the time to talk about parties. "What's wrong?"

Jade waited until she was close to Dave before she began talking. "I'm worried about John," she said honestly, "You've seen him lately, right? He's been slacking off in training! And I can't even remember the last time we went and practiced archery together. It used to be an every-day thing! Rose tells me not to worry about him, but I can't help it!"

"Shh, take a breather," Dave said, trying to calm her with his suave words and cool exterior that didn't even hint at the worry he felt as well, "John's a guy. He's got to figure this stuff out for himself. He's never been a good fighter anyway, he could be looking for something else to do with his life."

Truthfully that would be better for everyone. As enthusiastic as John was about his work, Dave knew the dorky boy would freeze up the moment he had to fight a troll.

"That would be fine, but he's not going anywhere in the city," Jade answered, "I've seen him leave. He goes off into the woods every afternoon, and he never returns until sunset. Sometimes he even forgets his weapons! I know I shouldn't worry, but the trolls will be here any day now, and if John gets caught out there without any way to protect himself-"

"Relax, we'll get to the bottom of this." Dave didn't want Jade worrying so much over something that was probably nothing. John was probably just going to the next town over. Maybe he was looking for excitement, or something different. He didn't particularly like the idea of stalking one of his best friends, but if it would put Jade's mind at rest, then so be it. "We'll follow him and see where he's going. Will that help?"

Jade nodded. She still looked distraught, which would make Dave frown if he didn't perpetually have a neutral look on his face, but that would hopefully be cleared up soon.

And hell, maybe Dave would get that chance to finally ask Jade out.

\---

The next day, John and Karkat decided to go check on the strawberry patch they had stumbled across before. It was later in the season now, and the first berries should have been ripening up. John was sure he wouldn't get to eat any, though: Karkat was insanely protective of those berries for some reason. Asking about it only got an answer of "They are food," which didn't answer anything at all.

As usual, John took to chatting while they walked. "You know, there's going to be a festival soon," he said.

This was met by a grunt of indifference, which John took as a sign to continue, "People from all over are going to be coming to the town. There's going to be lots of music and dancing, and there will be so much food too!"

The word 'food' caught Karkat's attention, as it always did. "What food?"

John laughed. "All kinds! Fruits, vegetables, bread, pies, everything! Rose usually makes some food from Derse too, but I don't think she's going to this year, since it'll be her first time going as an adult. I'll save some and bring it to you."

This promise got a pleased almost-purr from Karkat, and John quickly looked back and said, "That word. What does it mean?"

The question was met with a flat look from Karkat as he said, "Not a word, fuckass."

"Hey, you're the one who said I had to learn troll words," John said, "I have to ask."

In response, Karkat growled something which sounded like an insult. Then, before John could ask, Karkat translated it, saying, "Stupid human."

"Hey, I'm not stupid," John protested, but it fell on deaf ears. Karkat just kept repeating those same words over and over in troll, almost as if he was mocking John. In response, John reached over and shoved him.

Karkat was clearly unprepared for such an assault, and he tumbled back over a log with an undignified yelp, landing hard on his ass in a puddle. The bright red blush of embarrassment that crept up Karkat's neck and face only served to make John laugh even more, and Karkat's bark of "Stop laughing!" didn't help at all.

Angered, Karkat leapt up and after John, who in turn let out a surprised yell and started running away. The chase was a short one, though, ending in less than a hundred feet when Karkat tackled John to the ground. In retribution, Karkat placed a clawed hand on John's face and pushed him towards the soggy ground. Only a muddy face would be a proper punishment.

John squealed as he laughed, trying to shove Karkat away. "Get off of me," he said in-between laughs, trying futilely to keep from getting even muddier. He didn't stand a chance, though: the once-weak troll had really filled out over the last six weeks, and he was now carrying the weight and strength a proper troll should have. This muddy shoving match was over before it began.

But John had one last trick up his sleeve. With one swift movement he switched from pushing to pulling, hoping to catch Karkat off-guard and end up flipping them. It did work, in a way: while they didn't switch positions, Karkat did lose his balance and fall face-first into John's chest.

Just in time to fall below the arrow that had been aimed at Karkat's head barely moments before, which then buried itself in a nearby tree with a loud thunk.

The struggling stopped. Both Karkat and John looked to the arrow, then in the opposite direction, which the arrow had to have come from. John didn't see anyone lurking nearby, but apparently Karkat did, as his demeanor quickly changed from 'playful' to 'shit is going down' as he let out a threatening growl. Then he promptly let go of John and leapt towards the brushy area the arrow had come from, stopping only when a man brandishing a sword stepped between Karkat and the hidden figure.

It wasn't just any man, though.

"Wait, stop," John said as he pushed himself to his feet. If his shout managed to catch Karkat or Dave's attention, they didn't show it. They were too busy having a tense showdown, waiting for the other to make the first move. But it wasn't one of them who took the initiative: it was John, who quickly placed himself between Karkat and Dave.

"What are you doing," Dave said harshly, "Do you not see the troll right there? Get over here, before it attacks you again!"

This didn't move John, though."Dave, he's not dangerous! He wasn't hurting me, he couldn't hurt a fly!"

"Like hell he can't! Stop being so stupid and get over here," Dave said again, and that time he shifted his sword to one hand and reached out to grab John with the other.

Upon seeing this, Karkat snarled out a sentence John didn't understand, and he attempted to move past John to get to Dave. John recognized this, though, and he quickly turned to face Karkat and hold him off. Then he shouted out, " **HEY!** Everyone just- just calm down alright? Back off, both of you!"

Neither of the two boys moved right away. They were both glaring intently at each other, refusing to back down until the other did. John knew that Karkat wouldn't move first, so instead he looked over his shoulder to Dave, and he said, "Please."

That finally got a response from Dave, who let out a rough sigh of displeasure as he let his sword drop. In response Karkat pulled back as well, but he kept his eyes on Dave the entire time, who did the same in return. They clearly didn't trust each other at all.

Once those two were calmed down, John looked back to the brush and said, "Jade?"

Jade peeked out, bow and arrow still in hand, but she didn't have it pointed at anyone right now. The look on her face told John much more, though: she was confused, upset, and above all worried. John felt a pang of guilt at seeing his dear cousin so distraught, and he mumbled, "I'm sorry," as he looked away from her.

"Alright, Egbert," Dave said, which made John flinch at hearing his last name. Dave never used his last name like that unless he was angry at him, "Care to explain just what the hell is going on here?"

For the life of him, John couldn't even begin to think of a proper explanation. "I- shit man, I don't even know," John said as he rubbed at the back of his neck, "It just happened, okay? He was hurt, I took care of him-"

"You _took care of him,_ " Dave said, emphasizing the words with an incredibly rare raise of his voice. Oh yeah, the coolkid was definitely mad. "Do you have any idea how insane that sounds? Why would you take care of an injured troll? Or did you forget the part where they're the enemy and kill us?"

That was the point where Karkat finally spoke up. "Not kill! Not enemy!"

Everyone else fell silent at that. Dave and Jade clearly didn't know how to respond other than to stare at Karkat, and John was waiting to see what his two friends did. Finally it was Jade who spoke, and she said, "Did…did that troll just _talk_?"

John recognized this as something important, for Jade was much more likely to sympathize than Dave was. "Yeah," he said, "Yeah, Karkat can talk! I've been teaching him, he's actually a really fast learner. He's been teaching me troll words too."

"Do I even want to know why you're learning troll words," Dave asked.

"Look, it's just a matter of communication," John continued, "We can't understand them, and they can't understand us. How are we supposed to communicate if there's not a common language?"

"There's not much to even communicate," Jade said in response, "John, they're trolls. They steal our food and kill our people. Even if we could talk with them, there wouldn't be peace talks!"

Once again Karkat butted in, saying, "Not kill!"

"Okay then, you grey-skinned demon," Dave said, barely hiding his contempt for the troll, "Explain it. How is raiding our lands and killing our people 'not killing'?"

Karkat looked to John, who could figure out the problem right away. Being from Derse, Dave had a slight accent that was different from John's. Karkat probably couldn't understand half of what Dave was saying, even if they were words John had already taught him. "He said he wants to know why you say it is not killing," he said.

With that, Karkat understood the question, and he returned to scowling at Dave. "Not human land," he said in broken Prospitian, "Troll land. Troll land for catch food."

"Hunting," John prompted.

"Hunting," Karkat repeated before continuing with his explanation, "Land for trolls to hunting."

"That's stupid," Dave said, "It's too cold up here half the year, trolls would freeze to death. Why do you guys need this land if you'll just die."

"Stupid fuckass human," Karkat said sharply, "All food home in cold month. All food here in hot month. Trolls follow food."

Suddenly it all clicked in John's mind. "Migration. He's talking about animals that migrate! During the winter they must stay where the trolls live!"

"It makes sense," Jade said thoughtfully, "I've seen the birds fly south every fall, only to return in the spring." Then a horrified look came over her as she said, "Oh my god, that's it! The trolls, they come back at the same time the birds do!"

For the first time during the entire conversation, Dave finally looked away from Karkat. He turned to look back at Jade, and he said, "Don't tell me you believe all of this."

"I…I don't know," Jade admitted, "It's too much to believe at once. But Dave, just look: this troll, he isn't attacking us. And if John's telling the truth, then he's been visiting this troll for weeks now, and he's never had a scratch on him."

"I'm telling the truth," John insisted, "Karkat has never hurt me, not even when we first met. He's my _friend_. I don't think he could have hurt me at first even if he had wanted to, he was all skin and bones…"

But John trailed off there as a horrible thought entered his mind. No. No, it couldn't possibly be true. John couldn't bear to even think about it, let alone ask. "Karkat…do trolls die from not eating? Are the trolls starving to death?"

Karkat looked to John, back to Dave and Jade, then finally to John again as he bit his bottom lip. John was struck by how utterly vulnerable Karkat looked, like what he was about to say would leave him exposed in ways a troll never should be exposed. Given how Karkat always covered up any signs of weakness, even when he was in excruciating pain, John could appreciate how difficult this must be for the troll.

In the end, Karkat didn't give a verbal response. He just couldn't bring himself to do so. Instead, he just gave John one quick, short nod.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Notes:
> 
> The deserts the trolls live in offer very little natural food. There are some animals, such as lizards and snakes, but they are often difficult for trolls to catch, due to their ability to blend in with their surroundings. Along the coastline there is an abundance of seafood, but it is reserved primarily for the sea dwellers and the highbloods. Any troll that isn't a blue blood or above either has to rely on a highblood for food or fend for themselves.
> 
> Centuries ago, lowblood trolls were nomadic, and would dine on different animals depending on the season. In the winter months, when it was too cold to travel north, trolls would feast on the abundance of birds that flew south. In the summer months, trolls would head north to the borderlands and track deer and other game. By doing this, there was always plenty of food for the trolls of all castes.
> 
> However, this was put to an end when humans started to move south and colonize the borderlands. Since trolls and humans do not share a common language, negotiations were nigh impossible. Each side saw the other as invaders, which started a bloody conflict between humans and trolls which has lasted for ages. Furthermore, the troll royalty won't fund an actual military campaign against the humans, as they see this as a 'lowblood problem' and not worth their time. In fact, they profit from the food shortage every summer, because it helps keep the lowbloods in check and their population to a manageable number.
> 
> Ultimately both sides are simply looking for food. The trolls wanted their hunting grounds, and the humans wanted land that thawed long enough to grow crops. However, because of their inability to compromise, both sides suffer. Humans live in constant fear of trolls, expecting to be dragged off in the middle of the night and horribly slaughtered, and trolls starve to death by the hundreds every summer because they can't use their former hunting grounds.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just a quick note before I begin this chapter: I won't be typing out Sollux's lisp, but it is still present when he talks. Not a huge detail, I know, but I just wanted to make a note of it before he showed up.

The warm breeze of late spring blew through the camp, acting as a signal for everyone present. For weeks now, ever since the pair of scouts had returned, everyone had been anxiously awaiting the moment when they could finally head north. The rations were scarce, and they would run out within two weeks. Every moment spent here waiting was one less moment of hunting.

The scouts had brought back good news. Rabbits were plenty this year, and they had seen many different kinds of fowl. That was excellent news, as trolls preferred the small game to larger animals like deer. Of course, they would take what they could get, but smaller animals sat better on their stomachs. Plus it sounded as though there was quite a bit of wild fruits and veggies, and while no troll ate them primarily, they were great fillers and lasted much longer than raw meat. Yes, this would be a very good year for the scores of trolls that relied on the borderlands for survival.

But the scouts hadn't brought all good news. They had been missing one of their number when they had returned. While that was hardly out of the ordinary—they were sent in groups of three specifically, as death was quite common and the trolls needed the scouts' information more than their lives—the particular troll who was missing caused quite a stir among a handful of trolls in the camp.

This moping around wasn't going to help at all, Sollux decided. Watching his friends look so crushed at the news of Karkat's disappearance was painful. Sure, they managed to put it out of their minds long enough to get their daily work done. Trolls were amazingly resilient like that. But at the end of the day, when they all came back to their shared tent to rest, Sollux could see that none of them were adjusting well. Even Aradia, who was by far the best at handling her emotions and looking neutral about everything, had her moments.

Perhaps it was the moping that caused his outburst late one night. Or perhaps it was his own feelings about Karkat, which he still hadn't sorted out yet. Perhaps it was a combination of both, along with much more. But for whatever reason, Sollux finally reached his breaking point. "Will you guys just stop," he snapped, his lisp appearing as his temper rose, "You're all acting like he's dead!"

Nepeta and Tavros were caught off-guard by Sollux's outburst, and they both just looked to him in surprise. Aradia could have been surprised as well, but if she was then she was hiding it. Either way, none of them responded, so Sollux continued. "Look, I know it sounds bad, but Karkat's tough. If anyone could survive out there, it's him. He's probably out there waiting for us to show up."

It was Nepeta who found her voice first, and she said, "But Sollux, it was winter! Even if he wasn't killed by humans, he would've frozen out there."

"Are you saying you don't believe in him," Sollux asked, to which Nepeta just fell silent and looked away, so Sollux went back to speaking to the group, "Look, we just need to go find him. They're taking volunteers for the first groups to go to the borderlands, so I'm going to go volunteer tomorrow. It'll give us a head start on finding him."

"Uh, not to rain on your parade or anything," Tavros said carefully, "But isn't that, the most dangerous job?"

Sollux nodded. "You guys don't have to go with me, but I'm going. You can stay here and worry, or go too."

Aradia, who had been carefully regarding this conversation, finally spoke up. "I am sure everyone here would want to volunteer to find Karkat. However, it would be unwise for us to all go together. Someone needs to stay behind, if only to let your matesprit know of the risks you are taking."

She was right, Sollux realized. In his rush to make a plan, he had completely forgotten about Feferi. She already didn't like how he went along with the hunting groups, especially since, as the matesprit to the future empress, he would never have to worry about going hungry and didn't have a reason to go hunting in the first place. But Sollux valued his friends as much as he valued Feferi, and he wasn't about to abandon them in their time of need. So, he nodded to Aradia. "Alright. Let's go in two groups. One of you comes with me, and the other two go back and let Feferi know what's going on."

"I'll go with you," Nepeta said quickly, which surprised absolutely nobody, "I'm the best huntress, you'll last longer with me there."

"Then Tavros and I will remain behind and tell the empress about your endeavors," Aradia said with a nod, and then she looked to Nepeta and asked, "Shall I pass this information along to your moirail?"

"Nah, not unless something goes wrong. He would just worry the whole time," Nepeta answered.

"Then it's settled," Sollux said, "We'll move out in the morning. If Nepeta and I don't send word by midsummer, then assume the worst."

Though some of the trolls present looked uneasy, they were all in agreement at least. Hell or high water, they were going to find Karkat.

\---

To her credit, Rose listened to her friends' story completely without interrupting, even though she could easily fill in the blanks about halfway through. She was already going over the details mentally by the time Dave finished speaking, though she did take note of the tense atmosphere as she decided how to approach this situation. "So," she said finally, speaking evenly, "John has taken in a troll and formed a friendship with him. Is that the long and short of it?"

All three of her friends nodded. Jade was the next to speak up, saying, "You see how dangerous this is, right?"

Rose nodded in agreement, and before John could protest she said, "It is very dangerous. Trolls and humans don't have a good relationship right now, and if anyone except John had found this troll, someone would have died." She couldn't help but smile softly there. Yes, John was the perfect person to experience this whole mess. "I suppose it is lucky in that retrospect."

"There isn't anything lucky about it," Dave said disapprovingly, "This isn't just going to go away. What are we going to do?"

Rose didn't know when she had become the de-facto adviser of the group. While she didn't necessarily do any leading, she still felt some responsibility for her friends, as they often took her advice to heart. If she made a suggestion, they would probably listen to it, even if it was something she didn't want to hear. Knowing this, Rose had to word her suggestion carefully.

Before answering, Rose glanced over at John. He looked so helpless right now, like his life was on the line. Technically it was, Rose figured: they could easily turn him and his troll friend in, and he would be labeled a traitor and banished from Prospit. There weren't many options for banished men, especially not men who were still boys in many ways. But no, John wasn't worried about his own life. He was worried about the troll. Rose could guess this right away, if only because she knew what John was like. Always so self-sacrificing, she thought to herself, and she finally came to a decision.

After all, she had made a promise, hadn't she?

"We do nothing," Rose said finally.

All three of her friends instantly looked surprised. "Nothing," John asked.

Rose nodded. "We leave the situation as it is. John, you continue to visit your friend. Keep teaching him Prospitian, and try to find out more about him. Dave and Jade, you two help me cover for John. Once this troll has warmed up to John, we can work on introducing ourselves to him as well."

"Woah wait a minute," Dave interjected as he stood up from his chair, rattling the tea cups on top of the table as he nearly knocked it over, "What are you saying? You don't want us to make friends with a troll, do you?"

"That's exactly what I want," Rose responded calmly, her gaze focused on Dave, "If we befriend him, we can learn more about why they come here every year."

"Sis, I love you, but you've gone nuts. This is a _troll_ we're talking about. I just told you that bullshit line he tried to feed us. If he's lying about that, then what else would he lie about?" Rose got the distinct feeling that Dave would be yelling here, if he weren't a coolkid. But even without raising his voice, his tone was quite frightening, and Jade and John were already shrinking in their seats. Rose felt lucky that she had grown up with Dave: if this were her first experience with him being upset, she might have felt afraid as well.

Luckily, this was not her first experience with his angry self, and she was able to respond just as coolly. "Regardless of if he's lying or telling the truth, I want to find out more. It's clear that he's not going to run away, he would have done so months ago if that was his intention. We have nothing to lose by delaying our actions until we can find out more."

It was a gamble, but Rose felt sure that she would come out ahead. Would Dave take the bait? Would he follow the unspoken promise of 'we can turn him in later if he causes problems'?

There was a tense silence, and all eyes were on Dave. Though his shades hid his eyes, it was clear that he wasn't happy about this at all. The slight downturn of his lip spoke volumes, even moreso than the words that soon followed that look. "Alright," Dave said finally, sitting back down in his chair, "We'll do it your way."

With that taken care of, Rose glanced over at Jade and John. Jade still looked unsure, but Rose knew that she would stick with the group if everyone else decided to do something. John, on the other hand, looked immensely relieved, and Rose could sympathize with him. This had been quite a standoff for someone who had just recently become an adult. It was only fortunate that they had reached an amicable solution.

Rose wouldn't have it any other way, of course. This Karkat fellow certainly wasn't the first troll she had encountered, and she was sure he wouldn't be the last. In that case, it was best to establish good relations from the start.

\---

If there was one thing Equius disliked, it was how his work kept him away from his moirail. He would never complain, of course. Not everyone got the privilege of working directly for the sea-dwellers, and his skill with contraptions and machines had made him invaluable. But because of his work, he was usually stuck in the capitol, and Nepeta's love of the hunt kept her out near the borderlands for most of the year. Sure, they got to spend the entire winter together, but the months in-between were very long and full of worry.

Fortunately Equius' work kept his mind off of his worries, and his tendency to bury himself in his jobs only endeared himself to the sea-dwellers. He was one of the few blue-bloods who got to be in the grand palace regularly, which meant he was in the right place at the right time when a sea-dweller by the name of Eridan Ampora went storming by, the sound of his footsteps pulling Equius away from his work. He was curious as to why a sea-dweller would be here, in one of the back hallways of the grand palace, but he didn't dare ask. Eridan was higher than him on the hemospectrum, so it wasn't his place to ask what Eridan was up to.

Fortunately, he found out the answer pretty quickly. He slowed his work and listened to Eridan's footsteps, which ended not far past where Equius was. For a moment Equius thought Eridan had seen him, and was about to ask something of him. But Eridan didn't speak to him. Instead, when Equius chanced a glance over his shoulder, he saw that Eridan was talking to someone else entirely, a someone who was just outside of Equius' vision.

"So you were telling the truth," Eridan said, sounding very displeased, "They left four days ago."

"Of course I was right," a shrill female voice answered, "I heard it from a very reliable source."

"You mean that wimp of a troll who has no spine, don't you?" Eridan made no effort to conceal his disgust as he said that.

The other troll responded with, "Say what you want, he's really good at listening and spilling his guts to the first person who shows him attention. So, what are you going to do? You know your moirail would be crushed if anything happened to her precious matesprit. ........or is that what you want? If he's out of the way, you can move right in and take her four yourself."

"I got over those feelings long ago," Eridan snapped, "Of course I'm going after him! He's a dumbass who will just get himself killed. He'll need help if he wants to stay alive."

The woman laughed in response. "How noble of you! But you know, he isn't alone. He has a traveling companion, someone who's equally interested in finding Vantas."

Vantas? That name sounded familiar. Equius was sure he had heard Nepeta mention it before, but he couldn't quite put a face to a name. He wished he could turn around fully and see what was going on, so that he could ask about this Vantas fellow, but he knew better than that. It would be outside of his station to do so. So, he settled for eavesdropping, which he already felt guilty for, since it was wrong of him to listen in on a highblood's conversation.

Eridan responded with, "Yeah, some girl who hangs out with them, right?"

The voice said, "Yeah, it's some green-blood by the name of Nepeta Lejion."

Now that got Equius' attention. Just what trouble was Nepeta getting into?

The female voice continued. "The two of them went off on that suicide mission without even thinking about their quadrants! Can you believe that? They'll be killed, and it's all for some guy who's probably already dead."

"Which is why I'm going," Eridan said firmly, "I'm going to catch up with them before they reach the borderlands. I don't care what the girl does, but there's no fucking way I'm gonna let Sol wreck Fef's life by dying."

Suddenly Eridan started walking again, the footsteps coming closer to Equius, and Equius ducked his head down to look like he was very focused on his work. He listened to the footsteps as they went down the hallway and eventually faded away to nothing. Once it was quiet again, Equius was left wondering what to do with this dilemma. Nepeta was marching away into a deadly situation, one which would probably kill her, and the one person who had any chance of stopping them wasn't even considering Nepeta's well-being.

But Equius was torn. If he went to go find her, he would be abandoning his job, which was well outside of acceptable behavior for him. But on the other hand, if he didn't go find her, he would be failing at his duty as a moirail, which would be just as bad as disobeying an order from a highblood. He was stuck: should he follow orders, or save his moirail?

Then it came to him. If he wanted to save Nepeta and still follow orders, then all he had to do was get ordered to go save her. And, as luck would have it, he knew of a highblood that was very interested in stopping the group Nepeta was with. It wouldn't be too hard to just ask to go with him, right?

Not wasting another moment, Equius pushed himself to his feet and hurried after Eridan. It may have been unusual for him to approach a highblood, but it was his only chance.

\---

Vriska waited in the shadows, watching Equius hurry off after Eridan. As he disappeared around a corner, she couldn't help but grin to herself. Yes, this was all coming together nicely. Just a few more pieces to move, and everything would be in place.

Within the hour, she returned to her respiteblock deep within the castle. It was unheard of for someone of her blood color to live in the land castle, where the sea-dwellers met with the highblood land-dwellers. However, there were many empty rooms, and it was far too easy for her to move around without being noticed. Carrying herself like she belonged there did wonders.

Once she returned, Vriska sat down at her desk and pulled out a sheet of paper. She scribbled a short message in her trademark ink, which was the same color as her blood, and let the ink dry before folding the letter and sticking it in an envelope. She sealed the envelope shut and addressed it to her favorite correspondent, then went over to the window. A sharp whistle summoned a bird, which sat still as Vriska tied the letter to it. "Take this to the rainbow drinker," Vriska commanded, and the bird took off a moment later.

This was going to be a glorious victory, Vriska thought to herself.

\---

Karkat couldn't believe the bullshit he had to put up with. That stupid fuckass John had to be the biggest moron in the entire world. Every day Karkat marveled at just how idiotic this boy was, and every day he could only ask himself if John could be even more of an idiot. Given recent events, namely that John was such a dumbass that he didn't even realize someone had been following him, Karkat had to assume that yes, there was more idiocy that he hadn't even seen yet.

To say that Karkat was miffed would be a gross understatement.

He hated this. He hated how he was stuck in this hellhole until summer arrived. He hated how he had to watch his every step, lest he get caught and killed by humans far smarter than John. He hated how he owed his life to the biggest dumbass in existence. He hated how his life was now in the hands of the friends of said dumbass, while they were clearly unhappy at his presence. He especially hated how the dumbass could continue on as if nothing had happened and they weren't currently at the mercy of those friends.

He hated everything, really.

"Hey Karkat!"

Karkat looked up from his fire-building work. John was carrying a pair of rabbits, smiling widely and waving like a doofus. Any cool points John would have won for being a halfway-decent hunter were immediately lost to that idiotic smile. Karkat just scowled at John and returned to building his fire. If anger could cause flames, those logs in front of him would have been reduced to ash within seconds. Sadly, the burning passion of his absolute hatred for everything in his life wasn't enough to start a fire. He had to use rocks and flint just like any other person.

"Karkaaaaat! Come on, say something!"

Karkat grit his teeth. He wasn't going to respond to this idiot. He was just going to start this fire and pretend every bit of wood in there had an overbite and stupid glasses. That would feed his hatred and make him feel better.

But the idiot wouldn't stop talking. Karkat didn't understand half of it, because John had a habit of babbling on about things that he hadn't taught Karkat the words for yet, but he never seemed to notice how Karkat didn't respond to it. Today it was some stupid shit about a festival of something Karkat didn't understand. Probably a stupid human festival, which was inferior to the obviously better Troll festivals. It would have been less grading on his nerves if John hadn't brought it up every day for the last two weeks straight.

"It's going to be so much fun! There's going to be dancing and food and lots of pretty girls! Well I don't know if you think human girls are pretty, but I know what's pretty for humans, and they're definitely pretty. Oh! And Rose says there's going to be some famous fortune-teller from the next town over! I forget her name. It started with a K. Karen? Katarina? Something like that."

Karkat was trying his best to ignore the rambling, as he was busy nursing the tiny flames that were making the kindling curl up, which was very difficult work and oh gog the idiot was sitting down next to him and _still talking what the hell_. "I wish you could go. I think you would have fun there! I know, trolls aren't allowed, but it would still be awesome."

Then John got this look on his face (no, Karkat wasn't sneaking looks at the doofus, fuck you very much) that seemed to scream 'bad decisions ahead', and he said, "Hey, I bet I could sneak things to you! Maybe I could get some of the decorations and we could hang them up here! And I could bring some cake. You like cake, right?"

While Karkat didn't understand most of John's rambling, he did understand that John was offering cake, and that made him look up and nod. If there was an offer of delicious cake, Karkat would take it. How he had lived seventeen years without the most delicious food in existence he would never know.

But that grin. That. Fucking. Grin. Why did John have to look like the entire world was suddenly full of rainbow-shitting single-horned hoofbeasts just because Karkat said he wanted some cake? That stupid grin just made Karkat even angrier, and he scowled once more before focusing on the fire he was building. He was so fucking angry right then that he could just flip that fire right the fuck over because fuck you laws of nature Karkat Vantas did whatever the fuck he wanted.

Anger was fine, though. Karkat could deal with anger. Sure, he had his good days sometimes, and he could tolerate John's shenanigans better when he was in a good mood. However, even when he was in a good mood, that anger always lurked beneath the surface, just waiting for the right moment to jump out again. And really, Karkat was fine with that. He had been full of anger all his life, and it was something he understood.

But what he didn't understand was how sometimes, when John said something particularly stupid, or when John grinned a particularly goofy grin, that anger would suddenly and completely disappear.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> While it's not technically illegal, romance between two trolls on very different levels of the hemospectrum is generally discouraged. It more has to do with practicality: lowblood and highblood life is very different, much like how peasant life and noble life is very different for humans. It is generally accepted that lowbloods romance with lowbloods, while highbloods romance with highbloods. There is no punishment for violating this social construct, but it is so ingrained into troll life that most trolls stick to their blood color and the colors immediately around it for companionship.
> 
> However, when a lowblood and highblood do fill a quadrant together, the lowblood will usually go live with the highblood, as it's considered unacceptable for a highblood to sink down to a lowblood's level. The only exception is when a sea-dweller fills a quadrant with a land-dweller. In that instance, both will live in the grand palace near the sea. While it was originally built for the subjugglators, who needed to stay in contact with the sea-dwellers, it has become the home of anyone who needs to be close to sea-dwellers.

**Author's Note:**

> Worldbuilding notes:
> 
> Skaia is the world, and Prospit is the name of the country this story takes place in. It's a pretty large country, though most of the population lives further north than the town mentioned in the story. This town is pretty much right on the southern border of Prospit, and just south of it is the land where the trolls live. It's supposed to be disputed territory, though the humans currently have control of it.
> 
> Climate-wise, Prospit would be analogous to midwest America. Hot summers, cold winters, and a short spring and fall. This does vary a bit, depending on what part of Prospit someone is in. Where the kids are, the snow isn't quite as bad as more northern parts. In the story it's about mid-March, so it's still pretty cold outside, but the snow is pretty much melted by now due to an early spring season.
> 
> The trolls live farther south, and it's pretty much hot all the time. Imagine Texas or northern Mexico. Mostly flat, some grasslands, a bit of forests, and a lot of desert.
> 
> Derse will be appearing eventually, and it's North-East of Prospit. Very long winters, with only a few months of spring, summer, and fall. It's far enough north that they have a solid six weeks of constant darkness, with a hint of sunlight just barely visible on the horizon during that time. A long time ago, Derse and Prospit used to be one country, but it was too vast, so the ruling family broke it up into two countries. There's still some tension between the two ruling families, as some agree with the split, while others don't. This happened hundreds of years before the current story.
> 
> Okay I think I'm done being a landmass nerd, if I think of anything else to add I'll include it in the notes for the next part.


End file.
